Great spot, nexxxus! Below is a Google translate of JMJ's Preface to Olivier Delevingne's book.
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PREFACE
The encounter of a composer with a new instrument, especially when it is innovative, is an emotional moment. What we could call a “link of sound” is then woven and connects them in order to give birth to a work. My awakening to sound came through listening to the environment of my childhood, the clamor of the city of Lyon, the noise of the trains, my mother's knitting machine which nourished my musical sensitivity, posing in me their indelible sonic imprint.
Then I tinkered, welded, manufactured, looked for solutions like the clever transformation of a shoebox into a patch when I started. The composer who loves electronic violin making must be somewhat visionary. Designer, engineer, tinkerer, musician, producer… and poet. This is what Olivier Delevingne calls the shaman-slasher, which may seem at first glance to be an oxymoron but covers the reality of the composer who chose electronic instruments to express himself.
Some people today fear with anxiety about being replaced by tools which can, on the contrary, be designed as a way of increasing humanity and creativity. However, the relationship with machines is a challenge that has always allowed me to push my limits. Grandson of one of the designers in 1955 of the Présence device, a portable Teppaz record player, I have been immersed in this challenge since my childhood.
The act of listening and the listener's experience are also at the heart of composers' concerns: our music is listened to on cassette, vinyl, smartphones, speakers, in concert, and it is essential for the creator to explore the diversity of listening possibilities which will also be an additional source of inspiration.
There is something ontological in the relationship with technology. We must have unconditional trust in what binds us to a tool so that it helps us explore the world and create sounds that will reach a universal dimension and speak to the sensitivity of a listener. For my part, I made the almost crazy bet of offering the same work, with the same sounds, to the audience of Coachella, Paris, Moscow, Shanghai or the Giza plateau. It is the use of cutting-edge technology tools that has allowed me to produce works that are universally received. To do this, you have to be a bit of a shaman, finding the object that will trigger an emotion in yourself and in others beyond cultural codes and the contingencies of societies.
And in fact, companies are not always kind to creators. My commitment to the defense of authors, as when I was president of CISAC, the International Confederation of Authors and Composers, also comes from my conviction that the artist has, in fact, a role in humanity, duties and therefore rights . Artificial intelligence which is based on data processing must also be put at the service not only of creation but of the sovereignty of authors over their creations. This will be essential for the shaman of musical creation to still live and this will require political will as well as collective mobilization. My numerous international collaborations allowed me to see that the relationship between a society and its artists was indicative of the value it placed on justice and freedom.
It is therefore the responsibility of the composer to work to respect these values. All this with oscillators? Synthesizers? An electronic violin maker with sometimes unexpected reactions like my first Mellotron of which only a few keys worked? I want to believe that the answer is yes, because these instruments work by the generation, transformation and emission of waves, and the wave is, along with the corpuscular part of man, what gives rise to light.
It is perhaps this awareness that made me get involved, as an obvious choice, in projects likely to contribute to the preservation of the environment and natural resources, particularly within the framework of UNESCO. If technology is sometimes held responsible for the destruction of our common good, I hope that music will be the crucible that unites it with the environment. When Olivier Delevingne describes his participation in a European Union project which put music at the heart of the connection between populations in Colombia, I can only be reassured about the involvement of many slasher shamans in the preservation of our universe, today facing the climate emergency, and the fact that music can and must bring vital oxygen to humanity.
I am delighted that this book challenges certain preconceived ideas about the music industry and questions the intimate relationship between the creator and technological innovation. The tribute to Pierre Schaeffer, one of my spiritual fathers, reminds us that beauty is not born only from the concern for the note and the melody that I have always tried to combine with its original sounds and in contexts without constantly renewed. From song to film music through the creation and use of new instruments like the laser harp, to my sound exploration around the world and in the metaverse, my journey will, I hope, have made a furrow poetic in the soil of the universe.
Jean Michel Jarre.
. Thank you for directing my eyes from a distance.
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