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Showing posts from February, 2015

Bass clarinet in A in Ravel's Concerto for the left hand

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On Sunday, March 1st, I'm playing the bass clarinet in the Ensemble Sable & Ciel, for the Ravel's Concerto pour la main gauche . I would like to invite you, but the concert is sold out. Conductor Joël Doussard designed a concert of French Music, with Fauré's Pelléas et Mélisande orchestral suite, and both the Concerto en sol and the Concerto pour la main gauche by Maurice Ravel . Pianist François Dumont will perform both piano concertos! Bass clarinet in A Ravel is calling for a bass clarinet in Bb and a bass clarinet in A. Given the cost/benefit ratio of the instruments, the bass clarinet in A has almost entirely disappeared. I am convinced that the timbre difference between an A and a Bb bass clarinet is less than the difference you have between bass clarinets from two manufacturers, or between two clarinetists playing the same instrument, or between 2 mouthpiece/reed combinations played by the same performer. But the bass clarinet in A did exist. For more i

Feedback Analog Synth

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Come tomorrow at the Coin de la Rue café, rue Saint-Malo in Brest: I'll be performing with Bretagne musicians at the RRRR jam. In addition to a clarinet or two, I'll be using for the first time a new analog synth built with guitar pedals: Yes, you are right: before the analog signal path, I put a digital delay, to be used as a looper on a microphone input. But this mic is not necessary: the synth can also be used as a kind of a no-input mixer , with two ring modulators and a pitch-driven VCO (Voltage Controlled Oscillator). This synth constitutes the core live electronics set-up for my up-coming composition Electroclarinet 4 .

Electric sax

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When working with the music students for the Désordre Electro-jazz project , I suggested some music to listen to, including a couple of electro-saxophone options. Here is a selection of my electric saxophone recommended listening: Gaël Horellou & NHX; Guillaume Perret & the Electric Epic; Matthew Burtner with his metasaxophone; Colin Stetson with well placed microphones around his saxophone. NHX I met Gaël Horellou when we arrived at the Lyon's National Institute for Applied Sciences, in the Music Studies section. He was as dedicated to music at the time as he is still now. Here is an excerpt of his NHX project: Guillaume Perret & the Electric Epic I like Guillaume Perret 's conception of the electronically augmented saxophone, a true electro-acoustic instrument, where both the acoustic sound & the electronic audio processing contribute to the musical expressivity. It's interesting to note that Guillaume Perret chose to work with several sidemen