Cinq danses profanes et sacrées — Henri Tomasi

Amazing Moments in TimbreEssays
Written By Annie Liu

EN | FR

Bassoon timbre has been described by orchestrators as thin, nasal, dry, pale, weak, and cadaverous (Wallmark, 2019), which casts the bassoon as the brittle, wizened codger of the wind section. These descriptors make sense considering the bulk of the repertoire and orchestral parts written for the bassoon throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, as well as its physical limitations during the instrument’s early life. Not until the twentieth century did the modern bassoon emerge, complete with extra keys, more volume (in both loudness and size), and an expanded range. Furthermore, reed quality and reed-making technology have improved over time with continuous research and the invention of precise tools. The sound of today’s bassoon far exceeds the range and intensity of its ancestors, and recent music written for the bassoon has increased in variety and complexity accordingly. Extended techniques for bassoon, including multiphonics and timbral trills (Ross, n.d.), create entirely new and almost uncharacteristic timbres, ones that listeners cannot even identify as bassoon sounds. Thus, the timbral lexicon for bassoon could use some updates.

The fifth movement of Henri Tomasi’s 1963 Cinq danses profanes et sacrées (“Five secular and sacred dances”) for woodwind quintet exemplifies the opposite of the aforementioned timbral descriptors. In the opening of the aptly named “Danse guerrière,” the bassoon squeals in its highest register, announcing an impending battle with aggressive articulation and unbridled indignation. For this movement, the bassoonist must abandon any hope of creating an elegant or blended sound and instead attack notes recklessly and fervently. In fact, the marking for this movement is “Sauvagement frénétique,” savagely frenetic–a clear call to arms. Furthermore, the bassoon solo line is marked “avec rudesse (sonorité appuyée),” with severity (emphatic sound). The bassoon in this movement evokes a hot-blooded warrior charging repeatedly at their sworn enemy, a clear juxtaposition to the frail old man pictured above. Rather than weak or dry, it is penetrating and intense, at times shrill, and always forceful. Punctuated by percussive upper woodwinds and a relentless French horn, the bassoon’s timbre in these excerpts defies stereotypes and pushes the listener’s boundaries on what they can recognize as the bassoon. It emphasizes the existence of a range of timbres that one recognizes as a certain instrument, in this case mostly dependent on register and articulation.

The spectrogram below depicts time on the horizontal or x-axis and frequency (logarithmic) on the vertical or y-axis. The warmer the colour on the diagram, the more energy or amplitude of that frequency is present at that point in time. The bassoon solo is in the center of the spectrogram (around 500 Hz), though some of the French horn’s notes are at a similar frequency, making it difficult to distinguish the line clearly. Most of the energy is concentrated in the middle-to-lower frequencies rather than in the higher frequencies where the flute, oboe, and clarinet are playing. Evidently, the bassoon’s solo and the horn’s percussive accompaniment take dynamic priority in this opening. This spectrogram also shows the abrupt, aggressive articulations from all the instruments: each note is punched, with hardly any gradual growth or decay at the onset and release.

 

Spectrogram from 0:04–0:08 from Henri Tomasi’s 1963 Cinq danses profanes et sacrées “V. Danse Guerrière: Sauvagement frénétique”

 

Since the bassoon has become somewhat obscure to the public today, it would be fascinating to conduct research presenting participants with various bassoon timbres and asking them to identify the sonic source. Even with prior knowledge of the bassoon, I imagine it would be difficult for someone to attribute, for example, multiphonics, to the instrument. Participants may not even know what a bassoon is, let alone identify it by timbre alone. Rebranding the bassoon’s timbral image requires exposing listeners to the vast array of possible bassoon timbres and expanding their auditory palate of the instrument’s capabilities.

 
 

References

Annie Liu
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