An exquisite corpse (four pieces resulting from a process of musical exchange between Jean-Philippe Gross and Jérôme Noetinger).
There is a great tradition of exchange and correspondence work in experimental music. In the 80's, there were a lot of cassettes with musicians who had never met each other but were exchanging sounds by post mail. Nowadays it's even simpler and more obvious.
The imposed period of confinement—in France between March 17 and May 11, and between October 30 and December 15, 2020—was ideal for restarting such projects.
Jean-Philippe Gross and Jérôme Noetinger have had the opportunity to play several times as a duo since 2009. They decided to start this new email collaboration based on the idea of the exquisite corpse. One musician created a first sequence and sent only the last 10 seconds to the next one who then mixed or pasted his sequence into it, and so on.
The first two "Cadavre" were published by Cafe Oto in-house label Takuroku in July 2020.
Excited by this new way of working, Jean-Philippe Gross and Jérôme Noetinger decided to go deeper into it. Each of the fourth "Cadavre" that you will find on this CD was realised in one day only, each musician having only 30 minutes to build his answer. The final result was only slightly modified in terms of volume.
The rawness of the process itself creates music that would otherwise be impossible to make. It's as beautiful as it is strange, improbable and unexpected, absurd and playful, and it is not easy to guess who does what.
Jean-Philippe Gross: Serge modular system, mixer feedback, field recordings, treatments, radio.
Jérôme Noetinger: Revox tape recorder, cassettes, CDJ, field recordings, treatments, radio.
Jean-Philippe Gross (born 1979, lives and works in Metz, France) is a French composer and improviser, founder of
Eich records, and Fragment.
Originally a drummer, he has played in the field of electronics, experimental and improved music since 2001. He plays with
Stéphane Garin (Dénombrement),
Jean-Luc Guionnet (Angle),
Jérôme Noetinger,
Axel Dörner, Clare Cooper (Nevers), John Hegre,
eRikm,
Lionel Marchetti. He has composed music for theater, dance and performances as well as for contemporary ensembles.
Jérôme Noetinger (born 1966 in Marseille) is a composer, improviser and sound artist who works with electroacoustic devices such as the ReVox B77 reel-to-reel tape recorder, analogue synthesizers, mixing desks, speakers, microphones, various electronic household/everyday objects and home-made electronica.
In his long career as a sound experimenter, he has collaborated and performed with many artists, including
Sophie Agnel, Angelica Castello, Antoine Chessex, Tom Cora,
Michel Doneda,
eRikm,
Giuseppe Ielasi,
Lê Quan Ninh,
Lionel Marchetti, MIMEO,
Anthony Pateras, Anne-Laure Pigache,
Aude Romary, Keith Rowe,
Mathieu Werchowski as well as ensembles such as Cellule d'Intervention Metamkine, Le Un, Hrundi Bakshi, Les Sirènes and Proton.
From 1987 to 2018, Jérôme Noetinger was the director of Metamkine, a non-profit organisation dedicated to the distribution of improvised and electroacoustic music. Until 2014, he regularly contributed to
Revue & Corrigée, a quarterly journal of contemporary sound, poetry and performance, which he had co-founded in 1989. He was also a member and programming co-ordinator of exhibitions, gigs, and experimental cinema at le 102 rue d'Alembert, Grenoble from 1989-1999.
See also
Thymolphthalein (Natasha Anderson, Will Guthrie, Jérôme Noetinger, Anthony Pateras & Clayton Thomas).
