Alain Thibault

Volt collects five works by Alain Thibault written between 1985 and 1990, music of rhythm and attack in which computer-controlled synthesizers and samplers replace the rhythm section and soloists must lock onto an implacable tape. In his booklet essay Jean Boivin places its energy in the resources of studio pop, rock and jazz, and compares the synchronised ensemble passages to Frank Zappa.

The Concerto pour piano MIDI (1989) keeps the classical three-movement form with a cadenza, the orchestra replaced by synthesizers and samplers that never mask the acoustic piano. It was commissioned and premiered by Jacques Drouin, who recorded this version on MIDI controller and sampler in 1990. Le soleil et l'acier borrows its title from Yukio Mishima but no text: it follows the first hexagram of the Yi King, with phonemes left to the singer. Pauline Vaillancourt sings the version reworked in 1990 for a Heiner Müller play staged by Carbone 14.

OUT presents four sections of Thibault's video opera for 30 monitors and two giant screens, set in 2084 under a world government led by a clone of President Reagan; God's Greatest Gift, built on a Reagan speech, won the Sound Page competition of Keyboard magazine in 1986. ELVIS (Électro-lux, vertige illimité synthétique), co-written with Walter Boudreau on the eight mutation phases in Timothy Leary's Exo-Psychology, is played by the Quatuor de saxophones de Montréal. Volt (1987), commissioned by the Arraymusic Ensemble for a concert of rock-influenced contemporary works, appears in its computer-controlled studio version.

Born in Quebec City in 1956, Thibault studied composition at the Université de Montréal, where he taught electroacoustic techniques from 1984 to 1988, and is a founding member of the Canadian Electroacoustic Community.

CD in jewel case, empreintes DIGITALes IMED 9003, 1990.