Musiques Démesurées Festival, review
By Roland Duclos, 13th of November 2016
Should excess, instead of measure, be the right key to music ? Such is the idea that seems to underlie the MUSIQUES DEMESUREES FESTIVAL which has been taking place in Clermont-Ferrand for the last eighteen years.
On November 10th 2016, the audience listened to a world première with Nocturnes by Akira Kobayashi and a recreation with Ultimatum by Pierre Jodlowski.
Ultimatum sounds like a harsh incantation, like a rebellious requiem, a kind of cantata for the end of times. There is an amazing actuality in the prophetic text of Fernando Pessoa (forbidden when published in 1917) and quite apocalyptic violence in the composer's music: the language is extremely tight with a powerful syntax and melodic fractures. During this concert, the audience is carried away by a threatening and frightening maelstrom from which a young female voice rose up. This strange angel or exterminating prince seemed to announce the Curse of the Last Judgment.
The Auvergne Orchestra, under the uncompromising direction of Yukihiro Notsu, gave a very much inspired and beautiful performance.
Roland Duclos
