LUC FERRARI : Chansons pour le corps

'The works on this disc show a combination of his musique concréte and instrumental styles. The point of departure for Chansons pour le corps was a series of spontaneous interviews with women on the subject of the female form, which Ferrari recorded in the Jardin du Luxembourg. It’s a great image, a young woman out for a Sunday afternoon stroll approached by a man wondering if she might allow him to record her talking about various intimate parts of her body! The interviewees were invited to speak about their eyes, hands, breasts and sex, and those who accepted did so with extraordinary candor. Novelist and radio presenter Colette Fellous was then asked to write texts based on the tapes. These were set for soprano and ensemble and interspersed with extracts from the original interviews. Ferrari states: “.the interpretation of the Chansons could be very simple, in a voice without vibrato, paying special attention to the words and their meaning.”
Et si tout entiére maintenant, a “symphonic tale” for voice, orchestral sound, and tape is an extraordinary and unique work. The orchestral score was performed, recorded, and then treated electronically in Ferrari’s studio; though the orchestra is never deformed beyond all recognition. This is incorporated into the piece along with authentic sounds of the Swedish icebreaker and its crew, and Fellous’ spoken text. What results is typical Ferrari genre-blending, inhabiting a region somewhere between fact and fiction, documentary and poetry, orchestral and electronic music. The text can be at times straightforward, at times tantalizingly ambiguous -dare we imagine some sort of sexual intrigue between the woman and the captain as well as the pilot? Fellous juxtaposes first and third person narrative, direct and reported speech, in a manner analogous to Ferrari’s masterly mix of composed music and recorded sound. Fellous says: “.(Ferrari) asked me to board the dream and tell him the story. So we set to work. He brought me sounds, I brought him texts. A rhythm was born. In such a way we tangled, untangled, mixed noises and words, fiction and reality, and from this came a symphonic tale whose sensual warmth tries to turn back the cold.”'



Chansons Pour Le Corps
1 Chanson 1 "Les Yeux" Interlude D'Instruments 9:53
2 Chanson 2 "Les Mains" Développement D'Instruments 5:31
3 Chanson 3 "Les Seins" 3:19
4 Chanson 4 "Le Sexe" Interlude D'Instruments 12:40
5 Chanson 5 Interruption D'Instruments "Chantons Dans Le Silence" 9:40
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6 Et Si Tout Entière Maintenant 34:08
Conductor – Yves Prin
Orchestra – Nouvel Orchestre Philharmonique
Vocals – Anne Sée

Credits
Clarinet – Carol Mundinger (tracks: 1 to 5), Sylvain Frydman (tracks: 1 to 5)
Composed By – Luc Ferrari
Engineer – Bernard Charon (tracks: 6), Jean-Pierre Junker (tracks: 6), Pascal Besnard (tracks: 1 - 5)
Executive-Producer, Art Direction – Brian Brandt
Mastered By [24-bit Mastering] – Steve Puntolillo
Percussion – Christine Lagniel (tracks: 1 to 5)
Photography By – Olivier Garros
Piano – Michel Maurer (tracks: 1 to 5)
Synthesizer – Michel Musseau (tracks: 1 to 5)
Text By – Colette Fellous
Translated By [Translations] – Brunhild Meyer, Martine Jore, Sabine Feißt
Voice – Elise Caron (tracks: 1 to 5)

Notes
Chansons pour le corps (1988-94) & Et si tout entière maintenant... (1986-87) both recorded March 1995 at Olivier Messiaen Hall in Radio-France, Paris.
Et si tout entière maintenant... received the Prix Italia 1987, first published by La Muse en circuit as Brise-Glace.rman and French.