Iannis Xenakis - Jonchaies (1977) pour grand orchestre

Jonchaies (1977) for large orchestra Composer: Iannis Xenakis (1922 - 2001) Performers: Orchestre philharmonique du Luxembourg, dir. Arturo Tamayo _________________________________________________________________ “Written in 1977, over twenty years after his breakthrough score Metastasis, Jonchaies represents the apex of Iannis Xenakis’ orchestral output. As a trained engineer, the Greek composer spent much of his career experimenting with the application of complex mathematical techniques to the compositional process, implementing ideas from statistics, set theory and geometry to arrive at what he called stochastic music. Whilst Jonchaies is a culmination of many of these compositional practices, it is remarkable amongst Xenakis’ works for betraying a palpable sense of the composer’s personality, augmenting its more cerebral concerns with a prominent communicative dimension. Scored for 109 musicians, Jonchaies is a piece on an immeasurable scale – even by this composer’s colossal