Saturne

Hugues Dufourt – Saturne (1979), for 12 wind instruments, 6 percussion instruments, 2 electric guitars, 2 electric organs and electronic sounds.

This piece has a particular story. As Dufourt tells it

I created, with Murail, an electronic organology, a set of instruments. Given the time [1979], we opted for analog techniques with some modular concepts. But then the computer was developed as a compositional tool and in the space of 5 years it swept everything away. I thought I was making a historical work and instead I was completely wrong.

We performed technical miracles to reconstruct it. If only to identify the problem which was at the same time historical, technological and restoration. It was not possible to fully digitize the sound results, nor to reconstruct the instruments from A to Z. It is only thanks to sounds reworked 15 years ago, when the memory was still fresh, that we were saved.

Saturne is the image of a desolate land, with cold and distant, but fascinating sounds, which evolve slowly, as the duration (about 43 minutes) testifies.

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