Ryo Noda

Yume

The Japanese Saxophonist and composer Ryo Noda, born in 1948, has placed his musical trajectory under the concept of East Meets West: a crossing of influences illustrated by Murasaki No Fuchi for Saxophone duo, in which the shakuhachi can be substituted for one of the Saxophones (AL 25 893).

How could he have not felt certain elective affinities between his creation and that of Douanier Rousseau (1844-1910), whose jungle landscapes are the expression of a dreamlike exoticism? Inspired by three of the naïf master's paintings, Yume – The Dream for solo Saxophone lets the listener first succumb to the incantation of The Snake Charmer (1907): the threnody imitating the flute, imbued with mysterious sensuality, is echoed in the surrounding Nature, just like the pale moonlight reflecting on the surface of the lake. In War (1894), the charred trees and crimson clouds surround the goddess Bellone, whose cavalcade is evoked by the 'slap' technique, and the devastation by the Saxophone's harsh portamenti. The Dream (1910) shows us this woman, nude in the middle of the jungle, the state of Nature before the Fall, the incarnation of archaic innocence.