Creation : 22 April 1965 at Théâtre Municipal de Strasbourg, France
Duration : 23′
Written for Les Percussions de Strasbourg, the Eight Inventions were performed for the first time on 22 April 1965 at the Théâtre Municipal Strasbourgeois with choreography by Manuel Parrès. Since that date, the Group has included them in numerous concert programmes.
1 Corale. In a very collected atmosphere, deaf chords sing a melody that is not very extensive and freely inspired by the plainchant. Mysterious melodies evolve around these sound axes to culminate in a brief middle crescendo, escaping their attraction only to return to silence.
2. Giubiloso. Brutal contrast with the previous piece. To a bell call, an assured response from the xylos, prolonged on a timpani background by the timbres which borrow, in a fragmentary way, a theme from the Corale, shows that this is a study of contrasting sound colours. The initial rhythmic group, where little by little the play is established between four partners, will assert itself dynamically by the gradual tightening of values.
3. Recitativo. After the jubilation, it is once again the conquest of a more interior universe that the slow, arpeggiated line of Thai gongs offers us, a melodic figure that will periodically interrupt, like an implacable fatality, a rhythmic discourse that hesitates to impose itself. The timbres seem to transpose a purely vocal writing.
4. Scherzo. Rhythmic study. Against a background of elementary snare drum texture, a melody with very frank turns entrusted to xylos, which are supported by cymbal effects. A short relaxation in the intensity, where we reach the figures of the temple-block on the oppressive roll of the bass drum; but it is only a heavy sky between two flashes of lightning. An unexpected and discreet coda punctuates the rest.
5. Lamentoso. This time the playing is organised around a theme exposed to the vibraphone, which borrows its approach from the music of the islands of the Pacific Ocean. The tam-tams iridescent with large beams of brassy colours, while the incantatory character is established by damped and grouped strokes with which the snare drum will dialogue, imposing its shorter durations.
6. Danza. Another rhythmic study which evolves in a very marked oriental atmosphere. The permanence of a simple structure, divided between toms and timpani, serves as a driving force for the simultaneous and accentuated action of various groups of opposite pitches and typical timbres such as these Thai gongs whose archaic melody captures the dream of the desert highlands.
7. Aria. A short melodic meditation of the vibraphone follows the “mantric” search of the previous piece, evolving on a distant quivering of suspended cymbals, tams and tremolos of marimbas. In this forest of timbres, the spiritual preoccupations of the Lamentoso, stripped of their anxiety, take on a more immaterial and serene register.
8. Diabolico. An exotic devil in his derisory works: the theme of the Corale is taken up again in short values by the xylos, this time aggressively distorting the original meaning, encouraged by the hammering of the haunting accents of the timpani and toms. Caricature of the initial inner effusion, the dance settles, until the final accelerando, in a panicky joy.