Potential research themes

Further details can be requested from the artist.

Under the committee’s final assessment, all types of research can be proposed as potential topics.

• However, projects which consist of providing documentation for works recorded by Kientzy may possibly be deemed a first priority.

These documents, also describing the composer, must give a classical account or analysis of the score and then, should also analyze the instrumental interpretation and the phonographic interpretation. Formal analysis made by the composer himself, if one exists, may also be included and counted. Analysis by ear will be applied to improvised works, and possibly even to others.

The priorities, mentioned above, should not obscure the fact that there are other research subjects (themes) of varying scope, but of equal importance:

• Kientzy’s management on his phonographic interpretations.
• Non-polarization on the alto saxophone.
• Means of this non-polarization
• Consequences of this non-polarization
• The SAXOPHONE TOTAL ordinary use of the saxophone without distinction of all 7 saxophones
• The ARCHI-SAX: with all or most of the 7 saxophones used (naturally acousmatic) not taking into account the time constraints of switching from one saxophone to another
• The choice of saxophones left to the composers and the non-predominance of the alto saxophone in this freedom, see Kientzy’s repertory from 1980 to the 2000s.
• The Senza vibrato absolute as normal sound (not sound with rare vibrato) and its technical-expressive corollaries
• The dedicated performer
• A rigorous performer (“exact” according to Horatiu Radulescu).
• In constant search of a sublimation of works by all means necessary in order to adhere to authentic production
• Authenticity in music
• A gourmet performer, hungry for sounds and sensations through sound considered an edible and nutritious commodity
• Composer/performer collaboration: experience, myths and reality
• How to recognize an unknown composer in a rehearsal or an electroacoustic concert. Look for the most poorly positioned individual in the room.
• A discerning performer, hungry for sounds and sensations through sound to be considered as essential commodities
• THE sound or the SOUNDS?
• Modern sound
• Modernism interpreted: what is modern in music?
• The particularity of Petroiu-Kientzy’s viola-saxophone timbral (con)fusions
• SAXOLOGIE is based upon commonly found models of instruments
• SAXOLOGIE applied in composition
• SAXOLOGIE applied in interpretation
• The Kientzy repertory applied to SAXOLOGIE
• The primordial influence of Kientzy’s immersion in organo-acousmatic creation on the work in SAXOLOGIE
• SAXOLOGIE how?
• Les sons multiples aux saxophones (Multiphonics) …
• Rationalizations of existing modes of playing
• The rationalized translation of modes of playing already existing on certain saxophones in relation to all others, when possible and with their related characteristics
• The invention of new modes of playing
• The presentation of all modes of playing, with the how, the possible(s) and the what is useful,
• Sorting and archiving thousands of various small documents
• Kientzy’s obsessive control on his phonographic interpretations.
• Interpretation which extends into post-production
• Recording is a singular means of expression, in its own right and not to be seen as a substitute; even more so if controlled/produced by the artist themselves, from sound recording to mixing, including all stages of post-production.
• The large part of the organo-acousmatic field in Kientzy’s activity.
• A very early but persistent and essential feeling, relating to the profession of becoming a performing artist on stage was felt by Kientzy, as if Johnny Hallyday had personally encouraged him to learn the guitar at the age of 11 or 12.
• A musical taste (which he shared with the Beatles) of introducing intrinsically heterogeneous instruments into their respective musical universes; was this by chance or through influence?
• Daniel Martin, an actor and stage director, and the director of SAXIST! a musical stage show (and a subsequent video) in which Daniel was the subject of the one man show in 1987, used contemporary musical pieces, was Kientzy’s main teacher of musical interpretation.
• The man without whom Kientzy would undoubtedly be absent from art music: Mr. Decouais. René Decouais was Kientzy’s first real saxophone teacher and the first who showed Kientzy the real potential of what classical saxophone could be. Kientzy was accepted into his program in the middle of the academic year at the Limoges conservatory and this took him on to his second and last saxophone teacher who he had for a year and a half at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris (CNSMDP).
• The fundamental importance of Romanian music for Kientzy
• Kientzy and the (Romanian) composers of the Epoca de aur (the golden age, in Romanian) during the 1960s, 1970s, and the 1980s
• The works and composers from Boulevard Mortier period
• Mi Ha Sefer, a musical work by Aldo Brizzi, and Musique Spectrale by Càlin Ioachimescu, 2 “stroboscopic,” hyper-microtonal works.
• The use of multiphonic sounds in Kientzy’s repertoire
• Micro-tonality in the repertoire of Kientzy
• The absence of transcriptions in Kientzy’s repertoire
• The essential influence of this organo-acousmatic musical path in Kientzy’s instrumental and interpretive developments
• “Sound mixing” the actual staging of sound
• A Modern but ABSOLUTELY classic art which does not confuse the avant-garde with cacophony, nor the classical with conventional.
• About the impossibility of being truly modern without being absolutely classic.
• Kientzy, a certified Classical Saxophonist recognized by the prize he received from the Paris Conservatory (CNSMDP): A unanimous First Prize in Saxophone, awarded in 1976 by a jury which included the inventor of the saxophone doxa, Marcel Mule. Later, after an indirect but rather long meeting with the latter at his home in the late 1980s, Kientzy speculated that he must have regretted his vote.
• The PHONOSTÜCKS (in music) is to concert works (konzertstück) as cinema is to theater.
• The CONCERTINOS, solo works of modest scale and length with an accompanying ensemble, also of modest size
• THE HEPTAMORPHOSES a work with 7 faces, one for each of the 7 saxophones, accompanied by three different instrumental ensembles combined in their 7 possible ways: A, B, C, AB, AC, BC, ABC.
• The recording studio as a musical instrument in its own right
• The little use of sax/piano works in the Kientzy repertoire and even the almost absence of the alto/piano in his discography. In the midst of 500 recorded works, among which dozens include the piano, there is but a single piece for alto saxophone and piano.
• As for quartet, only one exists (SSTBas), but not a “real” one according to saxophonists’ “traditional” instrumentation.
• Piano and other keyboards in Kientzy’s phonography.
• The diversity of instruments used as counterpoint to Kientzy’s saxophones in chamber music
• The “carnival” of instruments constituting the ensembles accompanying in Concertinos, Phonostüks, Heptamorphoses….
• “Friendly commissions” written at the request of Kientzy
• Why ? and How ?
• The secret of the success and influence of the contrabass saxophone, thanks to the contrabass saxophone case created by François Azambourg.
• The organo-acousmatic genre considered as chamber music in its own right, a meta chamber music created through the incredible power and means of the soniste (he/she that “plays” and interprets the sound through live mixing)
• The organo-acousmatic experience (instrument or instruments present and sounds heard through speakers).
• A great number of Concertinos.
• As well, many concertos.
• The volume and diversity of Kientzy’s discography
• Pop (vintage) instruments, from the psychedelic era, used in contemporary art music by Kientzy
• The “single tone of the classical saxophone sound » – a mystery that was felt by Kientzy at the conservatory CNSMDP, despite his acceptance of and adherence to it when he “arrived” from the psychedelic, pop and jazz-rock scene and of his initial experiences as a professional bassist.
• Pop or jazz Bassist, but never pop or jazz saxophonist.
• Moreover and in any case, coming from a deep musical ignorance, he approached his studies with discipline and he took pleasure in the adoption of the traditional sound of the classical saxophone
• The immense pleasure of discovering classical music through the unfairly, even stupidly criticized works of the classical saxophone repertoire (particularly French works from the mid-20th century).
• The influence (not the least to say the pleasant and influential weight) of his former pop music past on the introduction of “sonic electricity” brought into a new “saxophonist” universe.
• His resumption of playing the bass guitar for the productions of Cornelia Petroiu first (2012), then for his own productions and then overcoming the scruples of being a multi-instrumentalist in a cult music.
• His 5 special collaborations: Cornelia Petroiu, Càlin Ioachimescu, Mihail Vîrtosu, Reina Portuondo, Jean-Claude Dodin.
• His obsession with sound and space: see Meta-duo, Concertinos, Phonostücks, Mixings-interpretations.
• The ENNEAPHONIE A multi voice (1+ 8) mode and system for the interpretation of the music combining live instrument(s), electronics and tape conceived, by Daniel Kientzy with Reina Portuondo
• META-DUO
• TRIO PROmoZICA:
• LE SAXTUOR
• TRIO ALTO
• META-TRIO
• COMITÉ DES FÊTES
• TELECTU
• BAROCKO
• TRIO FENDER
• TRIO-UL MINUNE
• COMPACT-TRIO
• SAXIST!
• Maintaining the greatest rigor, without eclecticism and even less the idea of opportunism, Kientzy developed a repertoire encompassing all the various streams of musical creation of the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st, with the absence of only a few compositional streams.
• A gigantic repertoire, truly unique and composed of works written especially for him. Often the result of (friendly) requests, there have never been purchased commissions. Often they were spontaneously given by composers or solicited by Kientzy, but never transactional.
• Speaking to Kientzy after a concert in Valencia, Spain, Vandoren’s Jean Paul Gauvin said: “listening to you one wouldn’t say that you play contemporary music”.
• Criticisms of Kientzy:
• A classical saxophonist who doesn’t teach…

• “Kientzy plays badly”,
• “Kientzy doesn’t know how to play”,
• “Kientzy just plays anything.”
• Maximum diversity in the most rigorous classicism
• A few extremely rare pop-jazz nods to his ocean of contemporary classical rigor, unrelated to the use of pop instruments or of course to musical prostitution
• Use of impromptu improvisation in place of pieces prepared for encores after successful concerts
• An absolutely experimental path, but inseparable from the creation of a works-of-art
• Alongside classically long works, a small multitude of short pieces
• A performer-producer (phono) in contemporary classical music
• Introduction of pop processes into contemporary classical music production
• The performer-producer: a variant of the complete musician from the end of the 20th century.
• Modes of playing and their graphics, their design basis by Kientzy
• Modes of playing and their names, the basis of these names by Kientzy
• The MUSICA-FICTA adventure (his early music group), 33ips ARION disc.
• Used as a test subject or “Guinea pig” musician, mainly with Musica-ficta , at the INA for the “sound engineer” improvement courses by Mr. Albert Laracine, the inventor of the “Couple ORTF « …
• IRCAM: superficial official work but valuable artistic influence and practice of recording in the best conditions.
• Kientzy’s double bass experience playing in the Limoges opera orchestra for 3 years.
• Kientzy’s viola da gamba, cromornes, cornamuse and recorder experience playing in Musica-Ficta ensemble for 3 or 4 years.
• The children of OBELISC PENTRU Wolfgang Amadeus (by T. Olah)
• Real improvisations and non-jazz or its derivatives
• The miracle of the group COMITÉ DES FÊTES (improvisors Kientzy, György, and Franck Royon Le Mée) in the studio at the CERM (Centre Européen de Recherche Musicale Metz) European Musical Research Centre in Metz (1986). For example: A single recorded take, absolutely improvised without rehearsal and with the only starting point being a poetic proposition and/or a title drawn from our immediate concerns. For example: “returning from a lunch at the Chinese restaurant next door, confusion between the waiter and his customers (COMITÉ DES FÊTES) on the ingredients of the salads with tomato for everyone, chicken for one or for another, without chicken for a third, The title of the improvisation: “With or without chicken”. One take, that’s all.
• The role of Marie-Thérèse Kientzy for a portion of the museum at MaRSMMuCK.
• The essential participation of Marie-Thérèse Kientzy, at La Campagne in Paris Boulevard Mortier, for the existence of many works from the four corners of the world
• The basis of examples of use of each of the SAXOLOGIE modes of playing
• Chamber music experience
• Meta chamber music experience

 

Usually, books on modern instrumental techniques specific to a given instrument show examples taken from published works… therefore, already composed works. In SAXOLOGIE, the majority of the 100 modes of playing were “invented” during the actual research. It was therefore necessary to give examples for the latter and, ultimately, for greater homogeneity, for everyone.
Since then, in more and more written works, all have been used.
For the researcher: Find and comment on these terms in the musical scores of works written for Kientzy and their recordings :

• Slap-ouvert applied
• Tongue-ram-bec applied
• Arraché applied
• Jeté applied
• Inverson applied
• Baiser-bec applied
• Pizz-bec applied
• Libranche applied
• Inharmonico-diffraction applied
• Étouffé applied
• Timbrolodie applied
• Saxalpin applied
• Trompe applied
• Trompo-spectro-fluctuation applied
• Vox-trompe applied
• Baisers-Bocal applied
• Flûtage applied

• Tukusonie applied
• Barrissement applied
• Saxnay applied
• Harmonico-tuilage applied
• Souffle-continu applied
• Attaque-abrupte applied
• Réattaque applied
• Attaque-brève applied
• Attaque-longue applied
• Attaque-de-tampon applied
• Chute-abrupte applied
• Chute-brève applied
• Chute-longue applied
• Percussion-d’anche applied
• Percussions-de-tampon applied
• Détimbré applied
• Surtimbré applied

• Appoggiature-timbrare applied
• Murmure applied
• Glissade applied
• Simili glisse applied
• Dégoulinade, applied
• Slap-dégoulinade applied
• Voxax applied
• Sons-multiples applied
• Tuilage-éolien applied
• Éolson applied
• Sifflo-Éolson applied
• Cliquettis applied
• Sifflement applied
• Sons multiples applied
• Biphonie applied
• Biphonie and “prepared instrument version” applied

 

Examples of action

• of Sopranino applied
• of Soprano applied
• of l’Alto applied
• of Ténor applied
• of Baritone applied
• of Basse applied
• of Contrabasse applied
• of Saxophone-total applied
• of the archi-sax applied