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À chacun sa miniature: 31 composers

Bozzini Quartet

Le travail des quatre musiciens du Quatuor, en variant notamment la sonorité et les approches de leurs instruments respectifs, apporte les couleurs nécessaires à la transcription de ces partitions entre monophonie et polyphonie. Revue & Corrigée, France

Le Quatuor Bozzini a atteint une renommée internationale bien méritée par son talent et sa persévérance dans la programmation d’un répertoire musical ancré dans la recherche et l’expérimentation. Circuit, Québec

A vibrant portrait of the state of the art in Canadian new music.

With its collection qb, the Bozzini Quartet gives life to the diverse aesthetics of our time. The music in this collection forms a continuous line: without imposing an aesthetic stance, these discs follow a deep yet ineffable continuity of purpose. Each disc is a window, an opening into a singular world: the soul of a place, a common artistic language, or the distinct vision of an artist. The thirteenth volume of the collection presents a 31-part mosaic which is both portrait and landscape: a vibrant portrait of the state of the art of Canadian new music, and at the same time an undulating landscape of 31 paths, at once divergent, overlapping, merging, opposing.

À chacun sa miniature is the first disc release by the Bozzini Quartet dedicated entirely to emerging artists. This collection of miniatures was written in 2011 to celebrate the Bozzini Quartet’s studio-lab for the next generation, the Composer’s Kitchen.

Held annually in Montréal since 2005, this event is a combination workshop, laboratory, playground, and master class. The quartet and two experienced composers observe the work of six up-and-coming composers over the course of a week. Their compositions are read, played, assessed, analyzed, workshopped, played again, and performed in the closing concert. This laboratory gives young composers a unique opportunity to perfect their craft with professional musicians.

With this release, the Bozzini Quartet collaborates again in 2011 with 31 young composers, each of whom are alumni of the Composer’s Kitchen between the years 2005 and 2010. Within each piece, one can hear traces of exchanged ideas, sprouting from the lasting friendships made in the hothouse of intensity created by the Composer’s Kitchen experience. One can also hear the results of a now long-term relationship between composer and quartet, where technical expertise and aesthetic values are debated and shared over the years.

The composers generously gave their time and talent to write these miniatures, which were sponsored by the donations of over 100 community members in a large and exuberantly successful fundraising venture. With the help of the Placement Culture program of the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, the funds raised created a lasting endowment which will expand the commissioning activities of the quartet, support future Composer’s Kitchen activities, and help ensure the longevity of the Bozzini Quartet’s dedication to emerging composers in Canada. The Bozzini Quartet thanks the supporters and the composers for their generosity!

2 × CD (CQB 1113)

Disc 1

Disc 2

  • Label: Collection QB
  • CQB 1113
  • 2011
  • UCC 771028371327
  • Total duration: 90:41
  • 125 mm × 125 mm × 6 mm
  • 60 g

On the web

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In the press

Critique

Pierre Durr, Revue & Corrigée, no. 94, December 1, 2012
Le travail des quatre musiciens du Quatuor, en variant notamment la sonorité et les approches de leurs instruments respectifs, apporte les couleurs nécessaires à la transcription de ces partitions entre monophonie et polyphonie.

Critique

Chantale Laplante, Circuit, October 1, 2012

Depuis 2005, les membres du Quatuor Bozzini, entourés de compositeurs chevronnés agissant à titre de mentors, accueillent et accompagnent de jeunes compositrices et compositeurs dans un Composer’s Kitchen. Cinq ans plus tard, le Quatuor Bozzini a invité les trente et un compositeurs ayant participé à ces rencontres annuelles, à composer une courte pièce afin de célébrer l’expérience du Composer’s Kitchen, à la fois «atelier, laboratoire, salle de jeu et cours de maître», selon la définition donnée sur le site du quatuor.

Le Quatuor Bozzini a atteint une renommée internationale bien méritée par son talent et sa persévérance dans la programmation d’un répertoire musical ancré dans la recherche et l’expérimentation. À cet égard, le Composer’s Kitchen semble témoigner tout autant de cette démarche tournée vers l’exploration musicale, que celle de son implication dans la communauté. En effet, chaque édition regroupe six compositeurs venus à Montréal des quatre coins du pays, pour approfondir de l’intérieur le genre quatuor à cordes dans une atmosphère intime caractéristique de la musique de chambre.

Le disque À chacun sa miniature est en fait doublement ancré dans la communauté, le Quatuor Bozzini ayant pour ce projet lancé un appel au public afin de soutenir chacun des compositeurs et ainsi recueillir les commandites de cent membres de la communauté, mélomanes, compositeurs, professionnels de tous horizons. Le succès de cette campagne de financement a permis au quatuor de créer un fonds de dotation permanent dédié aux commandes d’œuvres et au soutien des activités du Composer’s Kitchen, afin d’assurer sa pérennité.

L’aventure du Composer’s Kitchen aura fait mouche, car pour la 8e édition du mois d’avril 2012, il a été présenté dans un format élargi en collaboration avec le Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, accueillant un mentor et des compositeurs du Royaume-Uni. Dans un deuxième temps, les œuvres achevées des jeunes compositeurs seront présentées en novembre à Huddersfield, dans la cadre du festival. Une autre édition (Atelier niveau baccalauréat) a également lieu à Vancouver en août 2012.

En attendant de pouvoir entendre les œuvres de ces nouvelles cuvées, nous avons accès à un enregistrement aux qualités acoustiques impeccables des trente et une miniatures de trente et un compositeurs qui témoignent, en écho à l’aspect mosaïqué de la pochette, d’une grande diversité de styles et, par ricochet, du dynamisme des jeunes forces à l’œuvre. Longue vie au Composer’s Kitchen pour sa complicité avec la communauté et les efforts investis pour que soient entendues et diffusées ces voix multiples.

Le Quatuor Bozzini a atteint une renommée internationale bien méritée par son talent et sa persévérance dans la programmation d’un répertoire musical ancré dans la recherche et l’expérimentation.

Review

Dolf Mulder, Vital, no. 840, July 16, 2012

Bozzini Quartet is a very special quartet. They have built up a varied and extensive repertoire. This time, with À chacun sa miniature the Bozzini Quartet makes a very generous gesture. On this double cd they present works from 31 young Canadian composers. Considering the amount of participating composers, almost a catalogue of what is going on in Canada. A bit too much also, because of the great number of new works. But a good opportunity to pick up what is going on in Canada. Their other new release Aberrare failed to fascinate me. This did not change after repeated listening, so this one was not meant for my ears. What kind of piece is it? Composer Martin Arnold is interested in continuation of music, but not along narrative lines. The music is not moving towards some goal, but it is more a process of unfolding, as the composer explains. In a way it is also dance music, what the composer concerns. But I felt it difficult to feel the same inspiration. Arnold is a Toronto-based composer and performer who had Frederic Rzewski, John Cage, Louis Andriessen, and others as his teachers.

Bozzini Quartet is a very special quartet. They have built up a varied and extensive repertoire.

Review

Nick Storring, Musicworks, no. 113, June 1, 2012

Since 2005 Montréal’s Quatuor Bozzini—leading interpreters of new string-quartet music—have hosted the Composer’s Kitchen, a workshop for emerging composers, where they hone their craft. In 2011 the ensemble approached previous workshop participants, and harvested thirty-one miniatures to celebrate the workshop and to be incorporated into the ensemble’s repertoire. This disc captures this large and widely varied body of pieces.

The double CD serves as a rare snapshot of Canadian talent born 1969–1985 and features the likes of Cassandra Miller, Emilie LeBel, Olivier Girouard, eldritch priest, and Taylor Brook. While the interests and sound worlds of the individual composers are radically individual, the album’s curation causes it to flow together seamlessly, as though it were one long work, making for a satisfying yet perplexingly uniform listening experience.

It’s not, however, without moments of surprise. In fact, in spite of the sly, smooth sequencing of the tracks, each piece is still its own tiny discreet world. Eric KM Clark employs blended vocal doublings of the strings amidst a stark microtonal sound world. Jeff Morton’s use of motivic pizzicati interspersed with oddly choked bowed notes is quite striking. Ghislain Lecroulant fleetingly touches upon material with strong ties to Ravel’s String Quartet. Daniel Brandes’ work takes luminous harmonic chords glazed with whistling from the quartet and intercuts the gestures with sharp bursts of noise. The Girouard piece masterfully deploys various techniques to create a cloud of mysterious, purring friction, with few moments that resemble string playing at all.

As always, the quartet’s execution is clean, precise, and radiant, making this a real treat to listen to, especially since the highlighted composers are seldom recorded elsewhere!

As always, the quartet’s execution is clean, precise, and radiant…
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