"Soap Opera : Journal d'un disparaissant" raconte, à la première personne et en 16 miniatures, l'histoire d'un savon qui ignore sa condition évanescente : il aime nager, se cacher dans le bain, est amoureux de sa maîtresse, jaloux du gant de toilette et ne comprend pas pourquoi il perd constamment du poids. Bien sûr, ça finira mal. Comique, certainement, mais aussi étrangement touchant : une sorte de métaphysique de l'article de toilette. Trente-cinq minutes de fantaisie et une métaphore pour la relation de l'homme avec la mort. 
Enregistrement de la création avec Robert Expert, contre ténor, et Laurent Cuniot dirigeant l'ensemble TM+.

"Soap Opera: the diary of one who disappears" is a 35 minute song cycle for countertenor and chamber ensemble (fl, cl, vn, vc, pno, perc). Here in its French version, Soap Opera relates, in 16 miniatures, the story of a bar of soap who ignores his own ephemeral condition: he likes to swim and hide in the bath, is in love with his mistress, resentful of the washcloth, and doesn't understand why he's exiled on this uncomfortable soap dish or always losing weight. Of course, it ends badly...  Comic but also strangely affecting, the piece is a sort of metaphysics of toiletries which stands as a metaphor for man's relationship with death.
This is the recording of the live premiere in Nanterre in May 2010, with Robert Expert (countertenor) and the TM+ Ensemble conducted by Laurent Cuniot.

Soap Opera, for countertenor & ensemble

FANTASIE QUARTET
for oboe and strings
premiere performance on March 19, 2023
Philippe Tondre, oboe • Dara Morales, violin • Marvin Moon, viola • Amy Sue Barston, cello

Silverman Fantasie Quartet

Elegy for the Earth

Elegy For the Earth - IX. World On Fire

Graviton is my third piece for orchestra. Have a blast! ;)

Performed by NorrlandsOperan's Symphonic Orchestra. 
Conductor: Petter Sundkvist 
Recording engineer: Johannes Oscarsson 

Graviton

Composed as part of the L.A. based Lyris Quartet's 2015 "Intimate Letters" commission/recording project. I imagined that if a letter is meant to be read, then music is meant to be heard. In this is 10-11 minute piece for string quartet, all the twists and turns that instigate change are begun by the second violin and viola...the first violin and cello have no option but to oblige and follow suit.

inside voice for string quartet (2015)

String Quartet No. 1

Hors emballage
Lumière! Lumière! Oh, cet affreux papier qui me retenait prisonnier a été déchiré: lumière! Mon parfum s’élève, mes formes se révèlent. Et l'eau, l'eau: quelle merveilleuse invention! Et ses mains, ses mains! Ô douceur, volupté! Oh, je suis heureux! Quelle vie merveilleuse que la mienne!

Out of the wrapper
Light! Light! Oh, this dreadful paper that kept me prisoner has been torn: light! My perfume rises, my curves are revealed. And the water! Water: what a marvelous invention! And her hands, her hands! Oh what softness! How voluptuous! Oh, I am happy! What a wonderful life I have.


SOAP OPERA: Hors Emballage

Mal rasé
Mal dormi: passé la nuit à réfléchir sur un lit de picots de plastique. Pourquoi m'a-t-elle donné cette couche inconfortable? Que lui ai-je fait? Ne fonds-je pas pour elle? Ne moussé-je pas assez? Je ne comprends pas. Quelle est la raison de cette punition? Je sais que les Indiens se complaisent à ces pratiques barbares… et encore, pas tous! Seuls les fakirs trouvent satisfaction à s'allonger sur ces tapis de clous. Non, décidément, je ne comprends pas.

Badly shaven
Couldn’t sleep a wink: spent the night on a cot of plastic pins. Why did she give me this uncomfortable bed to sleep on? What have I done to her? Don’t I melt for her? Is my lather too thin? I just don’t understand. What can be the reason for this punishment? I have heard that some Indians delight in such barbaric practices… but anyway, not all of them! Fakirs alone could find pleasure in lying down on those carpets of nails. No to tell the truth, I just don’t get it.


SOAP OPERA: Mal Rasé

Pensées érotiques
Ses seins! Oh, ses seins! Je ne savais pas que le monde pût contenir pareils trésors... Oh, splendeurs! Je ne me lasserai jamais de les caresser. Rien que d'y penser, je mousse!

Erotic thoughts
Her breasts! Oh, her breasts! I just did not know that the world could hold such treasures... Oh, splendor! I will never tire of caressing them. Just thinking about it, I foam!


Pensées Erotiques

La tactique du savon
Aha! Quel tour je lui ai joué ce soir! Dans le bain, je me suis caché longtemps. Ah! j'ai bien dû passer dix minutes à me dérober (je retiens facilement mon souffle). Je voyais sa main me poursuivre, et je m'échappais, virevoltant. Ah! Ça me vient vraiment tout naturellement. Il faudra le refaire. 

Soap’s tactic
Aha! What a trick I played on her tonight! In the bath, I hid for a long time. Ah! I must have spent at least ten minutes hiding (it’s so easy for me to hold my breath). I could see her hand sweeping for me, and I was always escaping, swimming further… Ah! It comes so naturally to me. We’ll have to do it again.


La tactique du Savon

Un ennemi
Rencontré le gant. Je ne l'aime pas! Il me regarde de haut. Enfin, de haut, c’est beaucoup dire, comme il est vautré dans l’eau à longueur de journée… C’est un mou, un fainéant. Et puis, vraiment, cette couleur... Enfin, tous les goûts sont dans la nature, je suppose. Ah! Et cette voix ridicule! Il se croit important, il pontifie, il glose! Et puis, ce regard embué, cette peau pustuleuse, il fait horreur. Et puis, vraiment, quel imbécile! Ne voit-il pas combien je suis indispensable? Qu'il n'est rien sans moi? Qu'on peut très bien se passer de lui. D'ailleurs, ça arrive souvent. 

An enemy
Met the washcloth. I don’t like him! He looks down on me. Well, look down, that’s only an expression, as he lies around all day halfway sprawled in the water. Such a lout, a lazybones. And really, that color… Well, it takes all sorts I suppose. Oh! And this ridiculous voice! Thinks he’s important, pontificates, preachifies! And that dank expression, that pocked skin: he’s repulsive. And really, what an ass! Can’t he see how indispensable I am? That he’s nothing without me? That we can very well manage without him. And that indeed it happens often.


SOAP OPERA: Un Ennemi

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Aha, quelle trouvaille! Je me suis caché dans le gant ce matin. Comment n'y avais-je pas pensé avant? Elle me fiche un peu la paix comme ça. Je me repose un peu: toute cette nage me fatigue. Ce tourbillon est dangereux, et ce cratère m’inquiète. On dirait qu’il me guette. Elle ne m'a trouvé qu'à la toute fin et m'a fait nager un peu pour me laver. Je l'aime toujours.

Hide and seek
Aha! What fun this morning! I hid inside the washcloth! Why couldn’t I figure this out earlier? That way, she leaves me alone a bit. I have to rest: all this swimming is just grueling. I find that vortex too dangerous, and this crater worries me. As if it were watching me. She found me only near the very end and had me swim a bit just to rinse me. I still love her so.


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A ten minute piece for 'Pierrot' ensemble written in 2000 on commission from the Da Capo Chamber Players. This is the live premiere.

PEAL

Le dernier chant du dernier oiseau

Piano Fractal no. 4 - "Labyrinth" (2019)
by Amos Elkana (b. 1967) 

* World Premiere Recording *

| The Israeli Contemporary Music Project

Amos Elkana: Fractal no. 4 - "Labyrinth" | Hagai Yodan, piano

Described by LA Weekly as “an original composer with something important to say”, French composer Philippe Bodin is a 2011 Guggenheim Fellow and the recipient of a 2010 Goddard Lieberson Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. A Doctor of Musical Arts from Yale University School of Music where he studied with Martin Bresnick, Jacob Druckman, Ezra Laderman, and Nicholas Maw, Philippe Bodin has taught composition in the Yale University Department of Music, at Illinois Wesleyan University School of Music, and at Lawrence University Conservatory of Music.
 
His compositions have received awards and accolades in several international competitions: VocalEspoo (Winner, Helsinki, Finland, 2018), International Alkema Composition Contest (Finalist, Utrecht, Netherlands, 2014), Shipley Arts Festival (Recital Music Award, UK, 2011), American Composers Orchestra Underwood Readings (Finalist, NYC, USA, 2007), Barlow (Honorable Mention, UT, USA, 2006), Lutosławski (Second Prize, Warsaw, Poland, 2005), Asia Pacific Festival (Winner, Wellington, New Zealand, 2006), Brave New Works (Winner, MI, USA, 2006), Homage to Mozart (Grand Prize, Moscow, Russia, 2006), Utah Arts Festival (Winner, UT, USA, 2006), Angelo-Comneno (Top Prize, Rome, Italy, 2006), and Music of Changes (Winner, Los Angeles, USA, 2001).

Philippe Bodin has received commissions from the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio-France, the Chœur de Radio-France, and Ensemble TM+ (France), Orkest de Volharding and Electra (Netherlands), Trio Kungsbacka (Sweden) and, in the US: Eroica trio, Mannes trio, trio Mojave, the Da Capo Chamber Players, the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, Empyrean, Albany Symphony Orchestra, Lost Dog, pianist Genevieve Lee and the Barlow Endowment, American Composers Forum, Jerome Foundation, The Argosy Foundation, and the Utah Arts Festival, among others.

Invited in the artist colonies of MacDowell, Banff, Yaddo, the Atlantic Center for the Arts, and the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Philippe Bodin also received grants from the Copland Foundation, the American Music Center, ASCAP, and Meet the Composer.

Previous to his activities as a composer, Philippe Bodin studied mathematics, physics, architecture, piano, organ, and voice. Philippe Bodin currently resides in Paris, France, working as a freelance composer and a teacher in vocal performance in the conservatory of Kremlin-Bicêtre.

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Philippe Bodin

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