Jean-Francois Charles

I used several ranz-des-vaches melodies in the composition L'écho des armaillis, for alphorn & live electronics . I sourced the melodies from the compilation Sammlung von Schweizer-Kühreihen und Volksliedern ( Collection of Swiss ranz-des-vaches and folk songs ) - mostly the third edition (1818) and the fourth edition (1826) . In the composition, you can hear the ranz-des-vaches from: Appenzeller Ormonds (Gruyère) Oberhasler Emmenthaler Ormonds (other melody) Entlebucher I also used this litany of cow names collected in the French Alps: Noisette, Jonquille, Pervenche, Reine, Violette, Papillon, Fleur de Lys, Paulette, Gentiane, Rosalie, Bleuette, Pivoine, Rosette. You can read them in this excerpt from our performance score: To know more about the alphorn and its use by composers, read Frances Jones's dissertation: The alphorn in western art music : a cultural and historical study .

The armailli, a cattleman, spends the summer on the alp with a herd of cows. The milk produced in these mountains gives cheese a unique taste. In some places, cows are trained to recognize their own ranz-des-vaches , i.e. the specific alphorn call of their cattleman. When the armailli plays the alphorn, rock faces and fir trees answer with echoes of different characters. This composition features ancestral melodies whose echoes you can still hear when you hike in the Swiss and French Alps.

Wednesday, December 8: authentic Swiss cow bells & washboard on stage in the Voxman Concert Hall. Ready for the premiere of a new piece for alphorn & live electronics, with Katy Ambrose.

In the fall of 2021, I taught the LOUi ensemble (Laptop Orchestra at the University of Iowa) online. With a great group of six students, we learnt about the tradition of looper performances. Every student installed the Logelloop looper software and composed a new piece using it. The concert took place with a very limited audience (just the members of the course) and was streamed live. Here are a couple of experts that show a great diversity of aesthetic approaches: even though the students used the same software, they really managed to keep their creations very personal. Knoflicek by Lou Barker hey buddy by Trinton Prater Haynes Manual by Will Yager ...but will the witch drown? by Matt Mason Wanderlust, by Michael May Revibrational, by Ross Clowser

Update: check out the Jamshid Jam album, featuring Ramin Roshandel on setār and Jean-François Charles on live electronics . A Form By Which To Be Possessed is an exhibition of new works by the BOLT artist-in-residence Maryam Taghavi . You are invited to the closing reception: Saturday, November 13, 6 pm Chicago Artists Coalition, 2130 W. Fulton St, Chicago, IL 60612 Ramin Roshandel and I are going to perform a duet setar & live electronics. We are going to respond to the art, and perform with Shams Asna (voice & spoken text). We hope to see you there!

This Thursday, October 7, virtuoso clarinetist Jean-Marc Fessard is performing Electroclarinet 5 in Madrid. Ensemble Sillages are giving a concert of works for clarinet, saxophone (Stéphane Sordet), and live electronics : the event is part of the 23rd International Festival of Contemporary Music in Madrid .

Kino-Pravda is a series of newsreels directed by Dziga Vertov between 1922 and 1925. This summer, during a residency at the Logelloù with Nicolas Sidoroff and Krystian Sarrau , we created a new soundtrack to Vertov's Kino-Pravda No. 5 and No. 6 : We recorded the soundtrack live on July 30, 2021. The Council of Three Dziga Vertov worked very closely with Mikhail Kaufman and Elizaveta Svilova . They constituted a Council of Three and published about Kino-Eye and their vision of film making. In these excerpts from a 1923 resolution, the Council of Three describe how the camera enables to see the world in new ways: I am kino-eye, I am a mechanical eye. I, a machine, show you the world as only I can see it. Now and forever, I free myself from humanity immobility, I am in constant motion, I draw near, then away from objects, I crawl under, I climb onto them. I move apace with the muzzler of a galloping horse, I plunge full speed into a crowd, I outstrip running soldiers, I...

The 24/24 concert has been a great back-to-school tradition at the University of Iowa. Composers and performers are paired on Friday at 5 p.m. The composers have 24 hours to compose a piece, then the performers have 24 hours to practice. The concert takes place on Sunday at 7:30 p.m. We are thrilled that we can have this Center for New Music 24/24 2021 Concert in person tomorrow! I'm especially excited since I wrote a new piece for the event: the organizers paired me with Mark Rheaume, who is both a composer and a trombone player. I wrote an homage to Juan Tizol , Duke Ellington's famous valve trombone player, who was a composer as well. The title of the piece is Legit . Juan Tizol thought of his tone as "legit", compared to more original tone qualities characteristic of other jazz players. Duke Ellington was certainly very glad to have Juan Tizol and his unique tone contribute to the orchestra's sound. But Tizol wasn't always convinced of the value of hi...

The Eleventh Year evening initially programmed on March 20, 2020 , was postponed because of the Covid-19 pandemy. We had the great pleasure to transform the initially planned 3-day event into a week-long residency at the Logelloù Artistic Center. With Nicolas Sidoroff (trumpet, objects) and Krystian Sarrau (tenor sax, modular synthesizer), we worked and composed together a new soundtrack to two newsreels by Dziga Vertov : Kino-Pravda No 5 and No 6. Krystian Sarrau, with Vertov's Kino-Pravda No 19 on the screen, picture by Philippe Ollivier The Kino-Pravda series consists in a set of 23 newsreels authored by Dziga Vertov between 1922 and 1925. Jean-François Charles on basset-horn & live electronics during the same rehearsal, picture by Philippe Ollivier The week ended with a full evening of music dedicated to supporting Dziga Vertov's pictures: Dziga Vertov: Concert & Cinema . Program: Prelude (live music) Kino-Pravda No 5 & No 6 (movie with new soundtrac...

Coming up, Wednesday June 30th: Françoise Kubler and Armand Angster perform Benedictus in the best concert hall for this piece: a church. This song features Baudelaire's poem L'examen de Minuit. The concert features Françoise Kubler (voice), Armand Angster (clarinets), and Marie-Andrée Joerger (accordion); Frédéric Apfel will be the sound engineer.

Will Yager and I had a treat performing live during the Seamus 2021 Festival. This double bass & live electronics duet was part of TWELVE - a virtual audiovisual playground , organized by CCRMA, the Center for Computer Research in Music & Acoustics at Stanford University . I hope you enjoy the music. Check out Will Yager & Jean-François Charles's EP: Krats/Strak

This Friday, April 23, we are performing live with Will Yager during the SEAMUS 2021 Conference . Our double bass & live electronics duet is taking part in the TWELVE interdisciplinary durational performance, curated by CCRMA at Stanford University . The TWELVE performance begins at 12pm (EDT), 04/23, and ends at 12am, 04/24. It features artists and musicians from around the world. We are performing on Friday from 8:30 to 9pm, EDT. You can stream this event from https://ccrma.stanford.edu/live/twelve/

Update: check out the Jamshid Jam album, featuring Ramin Roshandel on setār and Jean-François Charles on live electronics . Coming soon to the Englert Theatre in Iowa City: composer and setar player Ramin Roshandel and I perform on the Englert Stage. You can attend the concert safely from home on Wednesday, February 17th. Get your tickets now! Jamshid Jam Here is some information about that 30-minute show: According to Persian myths, Jamshid was the inventor of music . In Jamshid Jam , Charles and Roshandel attempt at, once again, discovering music. When Ramin Roshandel and Jean-François Charles improvise together, two traditions meet. Roshandel plays the setar; he has been trained in classical Persian music. Charles performs on live electronics; his improvisation background lies in European free jazz and avant-garde. In Jamshid Jam , haunting melodies and ancestral harmonies combine into a new imaginary folklore.