Ensemble InterContemporain, Pierre Bleuse - Unsuk Chin (2026) [Hi-Res]

Tracklist

01. Gougalōn, Scenes from a Street Theatre (Definitive Version 2011): I. Prologue - Dramatic Opening of the Curtain
02. Gougalōn, Scenes from a Street Theatre (Definitive Version 2011): II. Lament of the Bald Singer
03. Gougalōn, Scenes from a Street Theatre (Definitive Version 2011): III. The Grinning Fortune Teller with the False Teeth
04. Gougalōn, Scenes from a Street Theatre (Definitive Version 2011): IV. Episode between Bottles and Cans
05. Gougalōn, Scenes from a Street Theatre (Definitive Version 2011): V. Circulus vitiosos - Dance around the shacks
06. Gougalōn, Scenes from a Street Theatre (Definitive Version 2011): VI. The Hunt for the Quack’s Plait
07. Double Concerto for Piano, Percussion and Ensemble
08. Graffiti for Chamber Orchestra: I. Palimpsest
09. Graffiti for Chamber Orchestra: II. Notturno urbano
10. Graffiti for Chamber Orchestra: III. Passacaille



The Ensemble Intercontemporain and its musical director Pierre Bleuse continue their monographs on the great figures of contemporary musical composition. After the multi-award-winning Ligeti, it is the composer Unsuk Chin who is celebrated here. Of Korean origin, she moved to Germany in the 1980s. Her music shines with an immediate sensuality, and the inexhaustible transformations of her instrumental polyphony produce unprecedented sound constellations.

This programme presents her piece Gougalon (2009/12), which evokes the memory of the travelling amateur theatres of her native country, with deliberately offbeat instrumentation in six episodes. She presents it as ‘imaginary folk music that is stylised, fractured and only appears to be primitive.’ Chin titled her 2013 piece for large ensemble Graffiti. All sound registers are exploited in a colourful, lively and varied manner. ‘The musical language of Graffiti oscillates between roughness and refinement, complexity and transparency,’ says the composer. Her double concerto for piano and percussion completes this programme.

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