from Bach to contemporary music, the new symphonic organ and its 6,055 pipes will be at the party for their inauguration on 6 and 7 February.
Michel Garnier knows well: the penultimate night is often whiter. It’s been seven months since the harmonist the famous Austrian organ building Rieger, works by night in the deserted hall of the Philharmonie de Paris. Seven months he and his young assistant, Matthias Hollmann, take their hand guard tower when the audience patiently until morning tame a titan of more than 25 tonnes of wood and metal: the great symphonic organ of the Philharmonie and its 6055 pipes, whose official inauguration took place on Saturday 6 and Sunday, 7 February.
the French is a reference in the profession, but is anxious. “The organ is a quarrelsome and capricious instrument says this nervous little man who does not hide skin-deep sensitivity. There will be nice to have made the maximum anything can still happen. “
A note that refuses to ring, the other does not know to stop, not to mention the acoustics of the room, which forgives nothing, and will not let a hitch.
Michel Garnier is “the sound design of the charge”
. In consultation with College of Organists, he established the plans of the instrument. “The Philharmonic has contacted us in 2009, with a set of vague charges but left shows two imperatives. The organ was to be symphonic and French type. That is to say, with clear, smooth, rounded tones. Compared to the German organ that favors the readability of polyphony, the French organ prefers more fused harmonies. But there are also sets of trumpets, brilliant and powerful, for the parade. “
And to play the start of an exuberant fanfare as the French music outlet.
Expansion Asian market
A small victory song? The organ of the Philharmonie has almost never see the day, but for a handful of diehards convinced that a symphonic concert hall without organ is heresy. Corroborates that opinion, however, the expansion of the Asian market, South Korea and China in particular. Japan has already reached its saturation point.
It is 23 hours. Mechanical console of the organ at 25 meters high – the plate almost seems small, it is still paced by the commissioners of the Orchestre de Paris, who rank the deserted desks by the Symphony No. 5 , Anton Bruckner, played on January 28, under the direction of Paavo Järvi. Michel Garnier left the four keyboards and pedal mechanical console to slip behind the buffet in the belly of the whale instrument. The place is cramped, the passage is narrow, and you have to bend head and spine to grab the vertical wooden ladder leading down to the hold.
Inside, another scale, prohibited the profane for security reasons, leads, 14 meters above the second level of the organ. It is almost in the mausoleum of Emperor Qin: a non terracotta army soldiers, but forms of pipes, heights and sizes. tin and lead alloy for metal pipes (the more tin, the sound will be more clear), blondes pine trees, fir or beech Bregenzerwald for wooden ones. The largest of them were arranged horizontally to meet the logistical constraints of the room.
“An exciting job, but difficult “
” the organ is the only acoustic instrument that encompasses all other says Michel Garnier. one of the Philharmonic has 91 games or as many possible sounds (flute, violin, trumpet …). Each game consists of 61 notes, so 61 pipes. The largest, which corresponds to the low F bass, measuring 7.23 meters and weighs over 350 kg. The smaller, 7.5 millimeters and a few tens of grams, gives high F piccolo. The organ practically covers the entire audible spectrum by a human. “
Virtually silent at first, pipes, handcrafted and préharmonisés in Rieger workshops Schwarzach, Austria, were sent to Paris. The art of Michel Garnier then entered the dance – a work that is both technical and musical. For harmonize organ is not only to give sounds heights. We must homogenize each of the 61 notes of a game, so that all have the same color and the same sound density. Michel Garnier has reviewed 6,055 pipes, note by note, to ensure that none of the batch so, like a voice out of place, because too easily identifiable. . This penultimate evening ultimate verification agreements before baptism wind
Michel Garnier never the issue was also symbolic: after forty-two year career and a lot of years face to face with thousands of mouths to pipes (a vibrating as the recorder) and reeds (with a vibrating metal tongue), open or closed, the man decided that the monster the Philharmonic would be his last creation. “This is an exciting job, but difficult , he pleads. most often works in churches, where it’s cold, and where access to the organ is difficult. The concert halls are heated, but accessible only at night. “
Michel Garnier and fulfills his fourth night odyssey in six years after the organ of the Musikverein in Vienna in 2010 and those in the cathedral of Regensburg in Bavaria, and the Saint-Michel church Munich.
mysterious and poetic words
the architectural constraints propelled the colossal instrument in room heights. Has added to it a requirement made by the architect of the place, Jean Nouvel: the organ chameleon, barely reported by some exposed pipes 32 (only 12 of which are fake), planted on an elegant acoustic cloud must remain invisible when not playing. An ingenious system of movable wooden panels has been invented so that he could remain hidden or leisure to unfold. Guaranteed effect for the viewer a full game started gradually shuttered leaving out a veritable tsunami of sound. While the play of light inside the mechanical evoke some kind of spaceship 2001, A Space Odyssey .
Is this a coincidence? The music chosen by Stanley Kubrick, Thus Spake Zarathustra , by Richard Strauss, precisely mixes the orchestra gigantic breath of the organ. Michel Garnier descended from his cloud to win the set. He sat in the second organ console, mobile one, that connects a cable broadband fiber glass machinery buffet, and unleashes the voice that control the elements. The language of the organ is full of mysterious and poetic words. We are not talking of air, but the “wind.” The opening of the pipes, which enlarges or shrinks carefully using a hammer and pliers to change the sound, is called “light.” The games, themselves, in addition to the known names of traditional instruments, summon strange Salicional, Prestant, Unda Maris, Nasard, Human Voice, Larigot, Quintaton, Heavenly Voices, Chamade, Bumblebee or Counter-bombs …
October 25, 2015, Michel Garnier had agreed, reluctantly, a first gallop of the test instrument. He still missing twenty games, but Thierry Escaich was first improvised before joining the Paris Orchestra in the Third Symphony with organ , Saint-Saëns. This time it is an instrument in full possession of his faculties that will sound throughout a weekend under the fingers of a host of renowned organists. For harmonist Michel Garnier, already author in 2002 of the organ at the Conservatoire de Paris, located not far from the Philharmonic, a career shaped outlet apotheosis for a masterpiece of invention and technology . An end and a beginning? Hope that the Philharmonic leaves no great organ often closed shutters.
text
Marie-Aude Roux
Photos
Antonin Laine
Video
Josefa Lopez
360 ° Video
> Bernard Monasterolo
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