Gérard Grisey: Le Temps et l'Écume, Les Chants de l'Amour

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Gérard Grisey: Le Temps et l'Écume, Les Chants de l'Amour

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The music Gérard Grisey composed in the 15 years or so before his sudden death in 1998 at the age of 52 is some of the most remarkable of the last decades of the 20th century. Though his final work, Quatre Chants Pour Franchir le Seuil, is recognised as a contemporary classic, much of what preceded it is still little known. The two substantial pieces on this disc belong to the 1980s; Les Chants de l'Amour, for 12 voices and prerecorded tape, was completed in 1984, Le Temps et l'Ecume, for four percussionists, two synthesisers and orchestra, five years later. Both are extraordinary. The 35-minute vocal piece gathers together phrases and names associated with love and weaves them into a patchwork of beguiling sounds, to which artificial "voices", generated using IRCAM software, add an unearthly dimension. While some of the vocal writing recalls Stockhausen's Stimmung, it never feels derivative. Grisey's ability to push his music into expressive regions that few other composers of his generation have ever reached is also demonstrated in Le Temps et L'Ecume, in which the rich terracing of Grisey's spectral harmonies produces a fabulous interplay of live and synthesised sounds. It's a disconcerting, thrilling work, and like so much of Grisey's music it's uniquely personal.

-Andrew Clements, guardian.co.uk