Name: Composer, Conductor, Enigma
Brand: Pierre Boulez

Bonus disc

Bonus disc: No

Catalogue number

ACME362CDX

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Colour

Colour details

Discogs ID

Format multiplier

Download code

Download code: No

Rough Trade Exclusive

Rough Trade Exclusive: No

Extended format

Extended format: No

Format detail

Format Music GB

Limited edition

Release date

2022-04-15

Signed copies

Signed copies: No

Supplier GB

Cherry Red (ADA)

Tax rate GB

Standard:20

UPC / Barcode

5013929336230

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Total Cap

4 / CD / Extended format: No / Rough Trade Exclusive: No / Signed copies: No

Artist

Pierre Boulez

Genre GB

Modern Composition

Label GB

Pierre Boulez was a French composer, conductor, writer, and organizer of institutions. Born on March 26, 1925 in Montbrison, France, he studied with Messiaen at the Paris Conservatoire from 1942 to 1945. Boulez inherited Messiaen's concern with rhythm, non-developing forms, and extra-European music along with the Schönberg tradition of Leibowitz. His early works were intense and disruptive, reflecting the clash of these influences. Boulez became a leader of the European avant-garde and created key postwar works such as "Le marteau sans maître" (1954). In addition to his creative output, he also had a successful career as a conductor.

In the mid-1960s, Boulez began appearing widely as a conductor and held positions as chief conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra (1971-1974) and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra (1971-1978). However, his creative output declined during this time. He focused on conducting while working on three big aleatory works inspired by Mallarmé but only completed one definitively finished work - "Rituel" for orchestra (1975).

Since the mid-1970s, Boulez has concentrated on his work as director of the Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique in Paris where he oversees a computer studio. One of his main works

Four-disc box set presentation is an anthology of Pierre Boulez’s early compositions; complex, radically new and quite ferociously uncompromising. Such fearless, notoriously demanding works as the second ‘Piano Sonata’ may be heard alongside the gorgeous ultra-modernist exoticism of ‘Le Marteau sans maître’ and ‘Pli selon pli’.

These breathtakingly ambitious works are complemented by the first recordings of Boulez as conductor, made at the Domaine musical, a society he formed in Paris during the mid- ‘50s to provide a platform both for modernist pieces by the likes of Webern, Messiaen and Stockhausen and works which had played a vital role in the evolution of music by such composers as Debussy and Bartok.

As a conductor Boulez flew high and fast, engaged as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic and as chief conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra by William Glock, Controller of Music at the corporation, and fervent new music enthusiast: “Boulez’s ear was fabulous. It was as though he was attached by a hundred strings to every member of the orchestra.”

Composer, Conductor, Enigma

Music GB