From Formula to Form: “Territoires de l’oubli” by Tristan Murail

Dmitry Batalov

Issue № 4 (780) │ 2022

Research article

From Formula to Form: “Territoires de l’oubli” by Tristan Murail

This article is written in Russian. You can read it here.

References

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Boulez on Music today. Transl. by S. Bradshow, R. R. Bennet, Cambridge : Harvard University Press, 1971.
Murail, T. Territoires de l’oubli. Editions Transatlantiques, 1978, https://classic-online.ru/ru/production/10178 (accessed 06 October 2022).
Nonken, M. The Spectral Piano, New York : Cambridge University Press, 2014.

DOI 10.34690/272

Author Dmitry A. Batalov

Affiliation Independent researcher, Moscow, Russia

Email dmitry_batalov@mail.ru

ORCID

0000-0003-1162-2094

Abstract

Tristan Murail’s work has a strong connection both with Liszt’s music and with the legacy of French composers who have transformed the features of Liszt’s pianism in a new way—Debussy, Ravel, Messiaen. In “Territoires de l’oubli,” Murail explores how to combine the possibilities of the piano with the spectral method of composition, to realize the effect of instrumental or even computer synthesis, and to build up a large form. The starting point for the formation of the analytical perspective becomes the phenomenon of the spectral piano, the essence of which is the discovery and disclosure of the new nature of the instrument. The author makes his analytical method based on listening and performing experience, and especially on tactile perception. The layer is singled out as the key structural unit of the texture, and the basic texture model is called a formula. The author denotes the cycle uniting the original formula with all its derivatives as a formant, based on the research of musical acoustics and theoretical works of Pierre Boulez.

For citation

Batalov, D. A. “From formula to form: ‘Territoires de l’oubli’ by Tristan Murail.” Muzykal’naya akademiya [Music Academy], no. 4, 2022, pp. 64–79, doi:10.34690/272. (In Russ.)

Published 15.04.2021

Approved 03.05.2021

Submitted 26.12.2022