The tiniest ball holding an explosive charge, grains of sound evoking
untamed vibrations, visceral waves produced by shocks that are ridiculously
infinitesimal and yet strong enough to make universes suddenly appear,
universes out of which sprout torrents and thunder; particles of sonic dust
singing in resonant caverns; flogging gluons, or even the bangs, the little
bangs, in other words sound as energy, what opens the doors eavesdropping on
life.
No work arises out of strict solitude, it is always the result of
intertwined fluxes, synergy, osmoses, both short and long seasons of passion,
research levels, questions, dives without a net, sufferings, rips,
melancholia, supports, findings, and shared illuminations. There is never one
single composer. We are all made of the sum of those we cross path with and
who transform us, allowing us to find the joys necessary to break out of this
isolation and distress. Thank you to everyone who believed in me, made it
possible for these works to exist and keep on existing, who lent me their
time, imagination and talent, who shared with me their wild creativity,
knowledge and skills, who were kind enough to share and give with a smile and
without keeping count. Most of all, thank you to those who have been close
and faithful to me for so long. They know it. This is a love confession
murmured to the ear.
Marcelle Deschênes, Montréal [English
translation: François Couture, viii-06]
The Devouring of the Sky
by Jean-Noël von der
Weid|imed_0681-0002|
Some works admit a bivouac deep into reverie; or some rough anabases under
the twin skies of raindrops; or elegant picnics among red poppies and
concrete. Works feeding our love for life, as long as life is extreme, like a
smile under the vault of the Dead. A permanent uncertainty in the trickles of
acoustic lights and the crystalline jet of silence.
Before anyone else, Marcelle Deschênes developed
diversity, and audio and visual polysemy, with frightening care: education
and composition; mixed, experimental, acousmatic, multimedia and spatialized
electroacoustic music; pluridisciplinary teamwork, cutting-edge technology,
and photography. Not in order to crush the spirits, but to put them onto a
new wave train and thus renew the Tree of Senses; to dig through our folds
and spice up the way our sound bodies — mosaics of forever-unquenched sensual
delights — fit together. And thus “find back the primeval nakedness, the lost
dimension.”
The result is music making use of all languages, music that is alive,
learned, felt and then understood; the classical music of tomorrow morning,
whose tears at its own flesh picture the development of imagination and
relevance of thought.
Marcelle Deschênes’ creations devour. Because
they are brief monuments; apocalyptic waves breaking over extremely small
spaces; amazed innocence within the thickness of opacity; exuberance and
decomposition. Because Marcelle composes her own
history of the world, this snowflake, which seems to have lost its whiteness,
although no one knows why.
Jean-Noël von der Weid, Paris
(France), June 26, 2005 [English translation: François
Couture, vi-05]
Expansive Spirit
by Rosemary Mountain|imed_0681-0003|
Stormy, serene, tender, bold — the music of Marcelle
Deschênes moves with ease through the gamut of emotions, often with an
exhilarating rapidity. The skill that crafts the sonic shapes of mood is of
such high quality that the listener is easily persuaded to relinquish control
to the composer, and accept the often dizzying colours and images associated
with the sounds. Sometimes such visual dimensions are manifest through a
multimedia presentation — but even in the purely aural concertworks, the
listener’s imagination is stirred to provide lush mental imagery. And
inherent within her music is an energy that demands a far-from-passive from
the audience.