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Boulez and the Founding of Ircam 2/4 : Meeting with Michel Decoust

At the request of Marcel Landowski, Michel Decoust established the Orchestre des Pays de la Loire between 1967 and 1970, before moving on to the Maison de la Culture in Rennes and the Maison de la Culture in Nevers. He later co-founded the Conservatoire de Pantin with Irène Jarsky and Martin Joste in 1972. In 1975, responding to a proposal from Pierre Boulez, he joined the team responsible for the prefiguration of IRCAM as head of the Pedagogy Department, a position he left in 1979 to join the Music Directorate of the Ministry of Culture.

Michel Decoust was the first person interviewed as part of the RAMHO project. This initial interview, conducted by Vincent Tiffon on February 25, 2019, at the composer's home in Buzet-sur-Tarn, was followed by a second interview conducted by François-Xavier Féron and Vincent Tiffon at IRCAM on November 22, 2021.

Can you tell us how you first met Boulez?

I had just received my harmony prize and was about to start composition at the Paris Conservatoire. It was October 1960. We were all friends: Jean-Claude Éloy, Paul Méfano, Claude Lefebvre... There were a few other people whose names I can't remember, but they'll forgive me. I was quite close to Jean-Claude Éloy. We were in a fugue class together with Madame Desportes because I was still taking my writing classes. We heard that Pierre Boulez was giving a course in Basel for composers, so we signed up. The courses took place every three weeks, spread out over the school year. [...] We'd sit around the piano, and Pierre would look at the scores, sorting them according to how closely they aligned with his techniques. Éloy obviously came first, and I came last! [...] When he saw the melodies, he became a bit nervous. Then he gave us an audition test, which involved listening to chords, identifying the sounds, and so on. As you know, Pierre had a phenomenal ear for music. Jean-Claude and I far exceeded his expectations, which I say with all due respect. I can still hear him saying: "Oh, those two little Frenchies!" Pierre was very attentive to what we could hear and how we interpreted it.

Can you tell us about your decision to return to Basel to attend Boulez's conducting course?

Yes. I went back to Basel in 1965. It was a three-week summer course and Pierre's first conducting course. There were three categories: one for those who were already conducting, one for those who had won a conducting prize at any school, and one for composers who wanted to conduct. I had won my conducting prize in Paris in 1962 but enrolled as a composer who wanted to conduct. Pierre Boulez was always very organized: professional conductors were seated in the first row; conducting graduates in the second; and composers who wanted to conduct in the third. [...] It was a grueling schedule. In the morning, there were three hours of chamber music from nine to noon. In the afternoon, there was the first rehearsal with the orchestra, followed by a second rehearsal in the evening. Before all this, we had to analyze the work we would conduct.

Jean-Claude Casadesus and [Michel] Tabachnik were also there: everyone participated in conducting. I worked on part of Le Marteau sans maître. I remember Pierre giving me a boost, which helped because I had some prior experience with contemporary music. Diego [Masson] said to me, "Did you hear what he said?" I replied, "No, what did he say?"—I hadn’t been paying attention. I had to prepare the Berg concerto for the next day. I adored this concerto at the time, although I now find the form somewhat bothersome despite still loving the language. For the final concert, Pierre [Boulez] said, "Decoust will play the first movement of the Concerto pour la mémoire d’un ange, and I will conduct the second." I was terrified! Pierre was so kind and affectionate, though. In the dressing room, seeing how nervous I was, he reassured me, saying, "Stand there and stay calm. Don’t worry; everything will work out."

Pierre Boulez, Bâle, 1969 © Esther Pfirter/Orkuss

One morning in December 1974, I received a phone call: "Pierre Boulez would like to meet you. He’s here [in Paris]." At the time, he was the musical director in New York, so his visits were [whistling] quick and intense. "When?" I asked. "Sunday, at 5 p.m.," was the reply. I lived in Saint-Denis, so I went to the administrative offices on Boulevard Sébastopol. Pierre asked me three things. First, he said, "Michel, I don’t know the French music scene anymore, but you do. Can you help me make sense of it all?" He explained that Nicholas Snowman and Brigitte Marger—who had recently returned from England—were also involved. "I need someone who can help me navigate all this," he said. I agreed immediately. The second thing he asked was, "If you agree, could you act as my minister plenipotentiary to several institutions you know well?" I again agreed.

He appealed to the state clerk that you already were?

Given your background, I intend to entrust you with the most important responsibility: teaching." I was astonished by the trust he placed in me.

He considered teaching [at IRCAM] the most important responsibility?

I think so. I sensed that this meeting was primarily about asking me to take on the teaching role. I was very surprised and must have stammered in response. I remember saying, "But you know... electronic music, as it was called at the time..." He cut me off, saying, "That’s not the issue. What matters is the concept." [...] The meeting lasted only about twenty minutes because he was between flights. By January or February [1975], I was involved in the planning meetings. He introduced me as the person in charge of pedagogy.

Over the four and a half years I worked with him at IRCAM, we agreed on several things. I didn’t always see eye-to-eye with colleagues in other departments, but I appreciated Pierre's rational approach. He would say, "That’s holding us back!" to which I’d reply, "No, it’s not restricting us; it’s about refining our objectives to be more precise about our goals." His working style contrasted sharply with [Giuseppe] di Giugno’s intuitive and improvisational genius.

By François-Xavier Féron, CNRS researcher in the Analysis of Musical Practices team in the STMS laboratory (IRCAM, Sorbonne University, CNRS, Ministry of Culture)

Quote: Michel Decoust - Interviews with Vincent Tiffon and François-Xavier Féron, 25 February 2019 / 22 November 2021, RAMHO project (Recherche et acoustique musicales en France : une histoire orale), STMS - IRCAM, unpublished.