New Recording of composer Philippe Leroux's music by percussion ensemble Sixtrum
(By Chris Maskell)
After playing 350 concerts, recording two albums, and appearing at more than ten international music festivals, contemporary percussion ensemble broke new ground by paying homage to composer (and Director of the Schulich School of Music's聽Digital Composition Studios) composer聽Philippe Leroux in their newest release, De la percussion听().听
Despite having previously worked with the Orchestre symphonique de Montr茅al, vocal group Chants Libres, and theatre company O Vertigo, 厂颈虫迟谤耻尘听had yet to聽release聽an album entirely dedicated to the work of a single composer. Featuring three of Leroux鈥檚 pieces in their entirety (two percussion sextets and one trio), the new record is a product of a long-running collaboration with composer, as 厂颈虫迟谤耻尘听co-founder Prof. Fabrice Marandola explained in a recent email interview.
鈥淚n 2009, 厂颈虫迟谤耻尘听performed De la vitesse, a percussion sextet originally composed for the famous French ensemble Les Percussions de Strasbourg. We worked a lot with Philippe during the rehearsals, which helped us to really dive into the finesse of his musical approach. His writing is extremely precise and made of multiple layers of complexity, yet totally unique and fresh to the ears of the listener. We all greatly enjoyed this first collaboration and decided to keep working together, first with a new piece commissioned by Sixtrum (De l鈥檌t茅ration) and then towards the CD project that we recorded together at McGill, in the MultiMedia Room, in 2015.鈥澛�
鈥淟eroux was involved in the recording at all stages of the process. We performed the two sextets several times before the recording, and Philippe came to every rehearsal. When preparing to play De l鈥檌t茅ration, we all spent some time in our workshop experimenting with sonorities, modes of attack and some of our unique instruments such as our sixxens 鈥� a set of six instruments invented by Iannis Xenakis that are made of metal bars not exactly tuned with each other. A few months later, we spent several days working through the first version of the piece to refine the mallet choices, which is crucial in order to render the exact intention of the composer. We premiered the piece later in the year, and each time we have played it since, we have been sure to invite Philippe to listen to rehearsals. The recording was preceded by three weeks of rehearsals, and up to the last minute, Philippe made very slight adjustments.鈥澛�
While the group is known for their pursuit of fresh sounds, Marandola explained that they were amazed by Leroux鈥檚 knack for composing innovative material. 鈥淲e were surprised to discover uncharted paths and new ways of composing musical time and of creating new sonorities in each of the pieces. This unique mix of creativity and complexity creates a performing challenge that is extremely appealing.鈥�
Interestingly, the ensemble also has strong ties to the Schulich School of Music's聽Percussion Area. In addition to acting as Percussion Area Chair, Marandola is also an active member in the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Music Media and Technology (). On top of this, ensemble members Kristie Ibrahim and Philip Hornsey are Schulich alumni, Noam Bierstone is a current D.Mus. student at the school, and Julien Gr茅goire was a member of the McGill Pecussion Ensemble under the direction of Pierre B茅luse. Finally, Schulich PhD sound recording student Denis Martin did the CD recording and mixing.
