Swiss Melting Pot
The Swiss Section of ISCM is not, as it usually is, an association of composers, it is on the contrary an umbrella association of a lot of Swiss structures dealing with contemporary music (organizers of concert-series, festivals, ensembles and so on). It was founded in 1995 by Jean-Luc Darbellay with the idea of realizing the World New Music Days in the whole territory of Switzerland in 2004. This festival, a very complexe project, included events in several Swiss towns with their orchestras, ensembles and soloists and the travel from one city to another with a special train, carrying all the delegates, the composers, the journalists and the organizers with him. It was quite a success because it took place without any problems, not even changing of program order...
The very special situation of Switzerland with its four languages, its two religions and a very rich geographical context being the water-castle of Europe where the main rivers are "speaking" their own language (german Rhein, french Rhône, italian Ticino and raetoromanian Inn), leads to a melting pot of different cultural influences. We find the traces of this fact in every swiss composers specific language.
So the roots of Jean-Luc Darbellays music, a composer living in Bern (a german speaking town) but having his origin in a french speaking region can be found in the french and german tradition.
His piece Séquences will be performed by the Zagreb Saxophone Quartet on Monday, 11 April 2011, at 4 pm at the Mimara Museum.
In Séquences for four saxophones some impressionistic sounds meet here the influences of Webern's music including elements of Boulez' and Messiaens' way of composing.
