Progressive Growth.

Henri Dutilleux in Conversation with Roger Nichols

Author(s): Roger Nichols and Henri Dutilleux
Source: The Musical Times , Feb., 1994, Vol. 135, No. 1812 (Feb., 1994), pp. 87-90
Published by: Musical Times Publications Ltd.

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/1002977

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

Musical Times Publications Ltd. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend
access to The Musical Times

This content downloaded from

128.239.99.140 on Thu, 11 Mar 2021 18:34:20 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
* Interview with Henri Dutilleux

PROGRESSIVE GROTH

PROGRESSIVE GROWTH
PRoger Nichols talks to Henri Dutilleux about his life and music

different ifin
RN: Do you consider there to be a nationalistic element thisyour
school and its music hadn't left its mark on me.
music? You can find traces of the technique in my music, but of course I've
used it in a quite different way, not at all rigorously. It's not that I
HD: I think it's important that an art, whether it's music or litera- totally reject its principles: what I reject is the dogma and the
ture, should keep its fundamentally national properties, whatever authoritarianism which manifested themselves at that period.
that nationality may be. It's good that artists of a particular country
should also steep themselves in foreign characteristics - Gide spoke You have spoken of the advantages of studying harmony and coun-
of 'fermentation' (he even used the word 'yeast'), the tiny grains of terpoint simultaneously...
foreign leavening which keep a national art alive. On the other
hand, at certain moments in history it's necessary to concentrate on ...yes, because before coming to the Paris Conservatoire I was
purely national qualities. Debussy, for example, went to an taught by an excellent musician, and he liked students to work at
extreme of nationalism during the First World War, at the end ofthese two disciplines almost simultaneously, not absolutely. He
his life. Even in peace time he held an analogous position, but on said that I very soon developed enough of a harmonic sense to be
the strictly aesthetic front - it was a kind of detachment from the able to go on to counterpoint. He taught counterpoint in a very rig-
music of Wagner, which was perfectly understandable because it orous manner (which is how it must be taught, or not at all), so that
was necessary at that particular moment. Wagner's music was when I arrived in Paris I was already well enough prepared to be
invading the music of France, especially through French intermedi- able to join both the harmony class and the fugue class. That
aries who were too much under his influence, particularly in the wasn't what normally happened in French teaching at that time; you
field of opera. But the language had a sort of emphasis which generally did perhaps three years' harmony, then counterpoint on
didn't match the French spirit at all, and I think Debussy was right its own, then fugue on its own. It's all quite different nowadays
to make his stand. and people understand how necessary it is to bring the two tech-
It's also a question of historical context. We might mention the niques together as quickly as possible. I think it's necessary
1950s and 60s and beyond when we were invaded by music that because it's to some extent a reflection on musical history, isn't it?
depended, to a really exaggerated extent, on the serial system. I Traditionally, French composers are more harmonically than con-
think that was dangerous too - people have used the word 'terror- trapuntally orientated: they have a taste for the beautiful chord, and
ism'. What could one do? Only defend oneself, not by words or for many Frenchmen this harmonic richness and refinement have
manifestos, but by writing music. been the primary aim - and I may say I too have followed this path
to a small extent all through my composing life. But I also needed
How did you learn about serial music? to develop my contrapuntal technique as an antidote to it. In fact,
when I was young I was very fond of fugue, which was perhaps
At the time I was completing my studies at the Paris Conservatoire another legacy from my Flanders ancestors.
in 1938, our professors never mentioned it to us. We knew the
name Schoenberg, but not his works. It was only after the war that There was no analysis class at the Conservatoire. Was that a seri-
we got to know his music and that of his pupils. It's strange that ous lack for a composer?
there should have been this eclipse, this lack of interest that went on
for years, from 1925 to 1950. There have always been important Very serious, I feel, because after that you had to discover every-
periods of development in music, and serialism was just such a thing for yourself. I finished my formal studies in 1938 and then,
period. I may say that, even though I'm a very long way from the during the Occupation, I was demobilised and returned to Paris. I
Second Viennese School, I've gained something from serialism all was determined on reading scores I didn't know and even composi-
the same. It's a question I've given a lot of thought to, and I've tion treatises, like d'Indy's. I immersed myself in scores out of a
studied a lot of works written using this technique, and as a result desire to analyse them. At the Conservatoire we had passed abrupt-
I've had to consider my position - perhaps I would have been rather ly from an excellent grounding in harmony, fugue and counterpoint

February 1994 The Miusical Times 87

This content downloaded from

128.239.99.140 on Thu, 11 Mar 2021 18:34:20 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 ing the Concerto for the left hand
played by Jacques Fevrier with
Charles Minch conducting. It's one
of my most treasured memories
because I was still a student at the

Conservatoire and I slipped in to the

final rehearsal. Yes, Ravel made a
great impression on us and I must say
that, in my own case, his influence
was too exclusive during a certain
period. It was somewhat to the detri-
ment of other important sources, such
as Berlioz. I didn't know his music

in its entirety. Now I accept it all,

even with its faults and errors; in my
view Berlioz was the great French
composer of the 19th century.
So I had to disentangle myself from
certain influences. In my earlier
works there's also an influence of
Faure - his music made a great
HENRI DUTILLEUX Photo: Malcolm Crowthers
impression on me when I was young.
He'd
to composition, for which we had no real basis. The basis has to also
be been a fellow student at the Ecole Niedermeyer with m
the study of scores, classical, romantic and modern. grandfather, Julien Koszul.
It was with the Piano Sonata that I took a step forward. It wa
I have to say that my dear teacher Henri Busser was not himself
turning
equipped to provide us with this sort of analysis. With Paul Dukas point, a work of transition, and from here onwards I ha
clearer,
it was different. I never had the opportunity of being taught by more precise vision of my aesthetic orientation. That's
him, since he died in 1935, but his critical sense was very say, until then I hadn't been so far removed from what you migh
highly
developed - as we know, perhaps too much so with regardcall
to those
his middle-of-the-road French composers who are rather
own music. But I've been told that when, at the first class hetoo firmly attached to ideas of elegance, charm, wit, even humour
gave,
- of course there's nothing wrong with humour in music, but not
he found that his composition students didn't know the Beethoven
everyone
quartets, he became positively tyrannical. It was true for his stu- is a Chabrier or a Satie. But from the Piano Sonata
onwards I found I was much more interested by large forms, and
dents, it was true for us. We knew some of his quartets slightly.
even by the prospect of changing and renewing them. There are
We were writing pieces for string quartet, but without knowing
Haydn or Mozart or Beethoven. pages in the sonata that I still like, others in which I don't really
find my true self. But in general it has a character, I was going to
Can composition really be taught? say 'plethoric', which went somewhat against the music we in
France were beginning to get to know: the piano writing of
Webern,
I think it's possible to teach everything of a concrete nature: har- for example, in which he moves towards a total rarefac-
mony, fugue, counterpoint, analysis, orchestration, and howtion - although in fact I didn't know his Variations at that time.
to lis-
ten to music. But as for composition, I don't think so. WhatIt's very hard to write for the piano today. Is there anything left
I do
to be
think is that, quite apart from these transmissible techniques, discovered on the piano as it is? That's why some composers
some
nowadays
professors are surrounded by a kind of aura. I don't think Faure, in have moved toward the electro-acoustic field and synthe-
sises,as
his profession as teacher of composition, had any startling gifts because they think everything has been said that can be using
the piano
an analyst; but he had an aura. Paul Dukas had one too, which was in its pure state. It's possible. But I think the medium
still offers opportunities to express oneself. It's the same with the
felt very strongly by his pupils, as did Darius Milhaud. Ultimately,
string of
it's this that matters, though one can't cite a large number quartet: you could say there's no longer any point in writing
instances. Both Schoenberg and Messiaen had this aura andfor that medium either, but that's really rather a narrow point of
tech-
nical knowledge as well. view.

You say you had to combat the influence of Ravel during

And the
after the Piano Sonata we come to the First Symphony...
1930s...
This symphony to some extent follows the sonata in making a
Yes, because in France at that time Ravel's music was at the height break with my earlier works. The Intermezzo, like the other move-
ments, presents a single theme - or rather not so much a theme as a
of its popularity. At the end of his life I went to several of his con-
certs at the Theatre du Chatelet and at the Salle Pleyel, and notablyline. There is a thematic profile, a sort of insistence on returning
to one of the last concerts he attended, in the year he died, contain-to certain specific notes, but each movement ultimately treats the

88 The Musical Times February 1994

This content downloaded from

128.239.99.140 on Thu, 11 Mar 2021 18:34:20 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
same idea. Together with that goes a rather more subtle form than series is presented vertically in four successive three-part chords -
in my Piano Sonata, and also something not found in my works at which the work is really serial, and it's less than four bars long.
until then: themes that subscribe to what one might call 'progres-
sive growth'. There's a tendency - it's almost entirely intuitive - Given that you mentioned a moment ago the 'terrorism' imposed by
not ever to present the theme in its definitive state at the beginning. the serialists, I wondered what the force was of the title
I'm not talking about cyclic form; that's different, because there 'Obsessionnel'...

it's a question of a theme which is laid down at the start, as in

Debussy's String Quartet. In my case, instead of that there are I didn't choose it out of malice, although I could have done! One
small cells which develop bit by bit. This may perhaps show the of the things about the serialist doctrine that I can't accept is the
influence of literature, of Proust and his notions about memory. abolition of the idea of supremacy. In my opinion, one can't con-
It's a difficult thing to explain, but it's important because it's cen- sider all the notes of the chromatic scale as being equal, because we
tral to my preoccupations from this symphony onwards - in my are all still (and I think it's a good thing) the inheritors of a tradi-
String Quartet, for example, where the 'parentheses' act as reser- tion. Personally I'm not at heart an atonal composer.
voirs of sound events in which you find either commentaries on
what has gone before or prefigurations of what is still to come. You also follow tradition in that some of your music is inspired by
When I began to use this 'procedure', if we can call it that, it literature - I'm thinking of your Cello Concerto, Tout un monde
wasn't wholly conscious. That came later, and gradually I began to lointain, and its Baudelairean associations. I see too that the first
exploit it deliberately. That's not to say my First Symphony, for of its two slow movements was originally called 'Vertige', but that
example, is easy to analyse, because many of its aims are disguised; you later changed this...
but what are not disguised are the obsessional chords, pivot chords.
You find these all through the work, especially in the second and ...because I found that the title belonged to one of the large French
third movements; and pivot notes as well. perfume houses... But I preferred 'Regard' because of the reference
In Metaboles, for example, I already had an idea, a vision of the in the Baudelaire poem to the green of his mistress's eyes. 'Miroirs'
overall form when I began the work. And in each of the five move- also refers to Baudelaire, to the poem 'La mort des amants': 'leurs
ments there's an element destined to undergo the process of 'pro- doubles lumieres... ces miroirs jumeaux' - this was an opportunity
gressive growth' and an element which will recur and develop in for me to write several pages using a mirror technique in retrograde
the movement that follows. At the end of the first movement you movement. But not only that - the mirroring occurs in every direc-
find the opening of the second... or rather, the other way round.... tion, not only the vertical and horizontal. I must explain too that
you could compare it with the way tiles overlap on a roof. This ele- the lines by Baudelaire which appear as an epigraph at the begin-
ment undergoes a succession of changes, of metamorphoses, until, ning of each movement were added afterwards. I didn't have any
after a certain number of them, as with insects, you find that there's specific lines of Baudelaire in mind when I started composing,
an essential change in its nature: the original idea is almost although it's true I was already immersed in Baudelaire's world.
unrecognisable. At the end of the most rhythmic movement, for Then I said to myself, 'I'm full of this atmosphere, so be it!'. And
example, you find a rhythm which will grow progressively as the later on, when I was nearly at the end, I sought out these correspon-
basis of the following movement, and so on almost to the end of the dences. I may have thought about them a little as I composed, but
work. But at the very end the 'metabolic' process is halted by a at all events I was determined to avoid illustrating them.
return to the main element of the first movement. The circle is It's the same with Timbres, espace, mouvement... subtitled La
closed in a way that corresponds with the notion of time as circular,
nuit etoilee. It's not absolutely pure music. It's a great problem, I
as in the seasons of the year. It's a rather personal kind of form,
admit. It's true, when I was younger I said that I refused to write
programme music. But you can see that for both Tout un monde
and I have to say I'm happy with the term 'metaboles', even though
lointain and Timbres there are references, either to the world of
some people have been surprised and said; 'Yes, but it's too closely
linked with biology or even medicine.' poetry or to that of painting - in the latter case to Van Gogh's 'La
nuit etoilee', an enormously powerful and disturbing masterpiece.
In the central movement you briefly introduce serialism. Was'Movement'
this and 'space' are both there. The action of the picture
part of your initial vision? is nearly all in the sky, between the monstrous, outsize stars, and
to a smaller extent on the ground, with the little church and then
No. When I say 'vision', it was simply of the form in the shape
theofimmense cypress tree, which follows the line of the church
an arch. In any case, there are always moments when surprises in giving the impression of aspiring towards the infinite - a
spire,
the way the piece is developing force you to modify your plan amystic,
lit- vertiginous sensation, such as you can feel when you're
tle. At the end of the second movement there's a melodic line E- alone in the countryside or by the sea. When Rostropovich com-
D#-A-G#-D-C#-G-F#-C-Bb-F-B, built symmetrically. I thenmissioned
took me to write a work I almost immediately had the idea
it apart and changed the intervals in the next movement by invert-
of writing a piece inspired by this picture; again, without wanting
ing them. Various composers who had not been very interested
to in
illustrate it exactly. But I had the picture in my mind all the
what I was doing until then - Boulez's entourage and Boulez time
him- I was composing.
self - did take an interest in this score. Perhaps it was because I
involved myself to a small extent in serial preoccupations. But
We come back to the 'mirror' idea at the very opening of your
Violin
there's only one point - at the end of the third movement, where the Concerto, L'arbre des songes...

February 1994 The Musical Times 89

This content downloaded from

128.239.99.140 on Thu, 11 Mar 2021 18:34:20 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 Good Friday Passion Concert
-April 1, -1994- Academy of St. Martin-iirtheFields
7.30 p.m. Conductor: Sir Neville Marriner
Works by Haydn, Rossini: Stabat Mater

Easter Saturday 1st Symphony Concert

April 2, 1994 Academy of St. Martin in the Fields
It's a palindrome, in fact. There are a lot of them in my scores, a
7.30 p.m. Conductor: Sir Neville Marriner
there are in those of classical composers. Sometimes the palin
Soloist: Thomas Zehetmair, violin
Works by Mendelssohn drome is a perfect one, sometimes not. In my quartet, Ainsi la nui
in the movement called 'Miroir d'espace', it's perfect, not onl
Easter Sunday 2nd Symphony Concert from the point of view of pitch but for durations too. But else
April 3, 1994 Orchestre Symphonique de Montr6al where in the work the palindromes are deliberately not perfect.
7.30 p.m. Conductor: Charles Dutoit My recent orchestral piece Le mystere de l'instant shows a rathe
Soloist: Boris Belkin, violin different approach from the organisational and formal point of view
Works by Ravel, Prokofiev, Roussel
as though I perhaps wanted to renew myself. There isn't this con-
stant reference to the concept of memory - I even thought of calling
Easter Monday Spring Concert
it Instantanes, a succession of snapshots, of states of being, but n
April 4, 1994 Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart
11 a.m. Conductor: Emmanuel Krivine necessarily linked one to the other. The idea came to me from
Soloist: Gerhard Oppitz, piano chance occurrence. Our country property looks out over the conflu
Works by Gershwin, Dvorak ence of the Loire and the Vienne and one summer evening, around
eleven o'clock, when there was still a little daylight left, I went for
Easter Monday 3rd Symphony Concert short walk just beyond our village and I was very intrigued by a su
April 4, 1994 Orchestre Symphonique de Montr6al cession of birdcalls. They weren't nocturnal birds and each one wa
7.30 p. m. Conductor: Charles Dutoit
singing a distinct song - there were about a hundred of them and the
Soloist: Radu Lupu, piano
Works by Berlioz, Beethoven, were coming closer and closer. Each one had its own timbre, an
Stravinsky, Ravel also a rhythm that was totally unorganised. This was what made i
so captivating, and this lack of organisation attracted me. The nex
day I went back at the same time with a tape recorder, but nothin
happened! And since then I've never heard the phenomenon agai
So the opening of Mystere de l'instant goes back to that idea - it's
kind of impressionism, which I know does exist in my music - bu
without trying to imitate the bird calls exactly. Even so, the firs
movement is called 'Appels'. The strings are very much divided an
this happens still more as the piece progresses; and the irration
rhythmic values make a brief appearance too.

In the Cello Concerto you quote from Baudelaire's 'La voix'

where the poet says: 'Two voices used to speak to me. One, insid
ous and powerful, used to say "The earth is a cake full of sweet
ness"... and the other, "Come! Oh come and journey in the land
dreams".' Has every artist got to make this choice?

Certainly. It's bound up with the very notion of work. Baudelair

says somewhere that 'work makes you stronger'. It's a very mor
idea. Asceticism has a distinct role to play, the artist has t
renounce so many things, so many pleasures; and in any case he
not happy unless he can find the opportunity to realise his true sel
Personally I spend some of my time extracting myself from th
need to deal with material problems which devour one's time, and
only find my equilibrium when I'm totally involved in my wor
and thinking of nothing but that. There's a spiritual side which on
must safeguard at all costs - I've always felt it, but more and mor
because these days one is increasingly beset by material concern
It's tempting to behave like some people who think only of makin
appearances, on the television, on the radio; and in the final analy
sis, that's not what makes a work. What makes a work is this con-
stant searching, and a spirit of renunciation.

A new recording of Dutilleux's two symphonies is reviewed on p

110 of this issue

90 The IMusical Times February 1994

This content downloaded from
128.239.99.140 on Thu, 11 Mar 2021 18:34:20 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms