Corwin Chair Series Lectures: Bayle, Pope, and Dhomont

Professor and Corwin Chair of Composition João Pedro Oliveira continued to make select Corwin Chair Series events available to the public as virtual events during Winter Quarter. These events included three lectures via Zoom with composers François Bayle, Stephen Travis Pope, and Francis Dhomont.

François Bayle

On January 22, Bayle spoke on his music and influences in a lecture titled “…J’écoute donc je suis…” (...I listen, therefore I am…). The composer was born in 1932 in Tamatave, Madagascar where he lived for 14 years. He studied in Bordeaux from 1946-54, and from 1958-60, he joined Pierre Schaeffer’s Groupe de Recherches Musicales in Paris. Between 1959-62, he worked with Olivier Messiaen and Karlheinz Stockhausen. In 1966, Pierre Schaeffer put him in charge of the GRM which, in 1975, became an integral department of the French National Audiovisual Institute (INA). Bayle also invented the Acousmonium in 1974 and launched the record series Collection Ina-Grm.

Stephen Travis Pope

Stephen Travis Pope gave a lecture on February 19 titled “Secrets, Dreams, Faith and Wonder: A Mass for the New Millennium,” that focused on his film, Secrets, Dreams, Faith and Wonder, a feature-length abstract music/video ritual of thanksgiving in five parts. The film follows the structure of rituals of gratitude celebrated throughout the ages and across cultures and religions. The five pieces of music incorporate voices in Latin, English, and Arabic as well as bird and whale songs.

Francis Dhomont

On March 12, Francis Dhomont spoke about his music and influences in a lecture titled “Abstraction and Figuration in My Music.” Dhomont studied under Ginette Waldmeier, Charles Koechlin, and Nadia Boulanger. In the late 40s, in Paris (France), he intuitively discovered with magnetic wire what Pierre Schaeffer would later call “musique concrète” and consequently conducted solitary experiments with the musical possibilities of sound recording. Later, leaving behind instrumental writing, he dedicated himself exclusively to electroacoustic composition.