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Bruits

Yves Daoust

Programme notes

This project was born out of a commission from the Sonic Arts Network (United Kingdom), for the realization of an environmental tableau, a type of musical postcard depicting a place that is dear to me.

Stunned by the noises of the ‘city,’ and in spite of my resistance motivated by a desire to fulfill the commission, I found myself swept along in a much different direction from that which was expected of me. The sound samples, captured for the most part in the summer of 1997 in the streets and lanes of the city of Montréal, were exploded, mutilated, in order to render them more appropriate to my memory — to my sonic impression of this city, explored in every sense.

Noise (‘bruit’ in French) is the dominating feature. ‘Smooth’ noise, a constant and immutable murmur — the sum of human machines. Explosive noises, heterogeneous fragments that invade from all angles like small darts that pierce through the mass in passing, only to melt again into the sonorous ambiance of which they are part: granular noises, infinitesimal parcels of sound that have lost their soul while loosing their cause, and which the wind sweeps away like dust; ‘marked’ sounds, like the long melancholic glissando that comes to earth from planes that pass overhead throughout the day. Everything is ‘spoiled,’ deformed, exploded.

  • Composer(s): Yves Daoust
  • Instrumentation: stereo fixed medium
  • Publisher(s): Ymx média

Works in this cycle

Children’s Corner

A series of tableaux, each centered around a relatively homogeneous, diurnal sonic ‘world’: street festivals, markets, outside sports, machines, public gardens, lanes.

The fragmentation technique used creates a generally hazy effect: a sort of sonic smog that sometimes clears to reveal the laughter or cry of a child combined with the infant-like squeals of the omnipresent swallows and of the “bip-bip” back up warnings that all types of large delivery and service vehicles with which are equipped (such strange music boxes).


Children’s Corner was realized at the composer’s studio in Montréal in 1997 and premiered on May 7, 1998 at the Bangor University (Wales, UK). Thanks to Joseph Hyde of the Sonic Arts Network (SAN, UK) to have ‘triggered’ this work. The stereo version of Children’s Corner was commissioned by Sonic Arts Network (SAN) with support from The Arts Council of England; the octophonic version (realized in 1998) was commissioned by ACREQ with support from the Canada Council for the Arts (CCA) and premiered in June 1998 in Montréal.

Premiere

  • June 1998, Premiere of the 8-channel version: Concert, Montréal (Québec)
  • May 7, 1998, Some Small Sounds from Nowhere, Neuadd Powis — Bangor University, Bangor (Wales, UK)
  • Year of composition: 1997
  • Cycle: Bruits
  • Duration: 14:57
  • Commission: Sonic Arts Network (SAN) with support from The Arts Council of England, ACREQ [8-track version] with support from CCA
  • ISRC: CAD500114330

Nuit

(Night) A long linear form, a type of adagio that reuses part of the material from the first movement, treating it in a much more formal and abstract manner. It is as though all the noises accumulated during the day continued, flattened, in the mind of the sleeper, reduced to a tinnitus that becomes confused with the sonic activity of nocturnal insects and with the very real, though distant, hum of the sleeping city.


Nuit was realized at the Charybde studio of the Institut international de musique électroacoustique de Bourges (IMEB, France) in 1998 and premiered in June 1999 during Synthèse, the Bourges International Electronic Music and Creation Festival (France). Nuit was commissioned by the Institut international de musique électroacoustique de Bourges (IMEB, France).

Premiere

  • June 1999, Synthèse 1999: Concert, Bourges (Cher, France)
  • Year of composition: 1998
  • Cycle: Bruits
  • Duration: 8:34
  • Commission: IMEB
  • ISRC: CAD500114340

Fête

(Party) It is summer and Montréal transforms itself into an immense outside stage: parades for various causes, political celebrations, festivals of all kinds (fireworks, jazz, comedy). Fête (Party) is a sort of allegro barbaro, a frenetic dance where music of the streets, clamoring voices, cries and whistles combine. A dizzy swirling of musical noises of all styles: fiddler and ‘accordioner,’ bag pipes, African drums, military fanfares, Dixieland, ‘classical’ musicians, electric guitars and rock bands.


Fête was realized at the composer’s studio in Montréal during the fall 2000 and winter 2001. Thanks to Christian Bouchard for his help in collecting sounds.

  • Year of composition: 2001
  • Cycle: Bruits
  • Duration: 6:09
  • ISRC: CAD500114350