Born in 1987 in Switzerland, Kevin Juillerat studies saxophone with Pierre Stéphane Meugé in Haute Ecole de Musique Lausanne and Marcus Weiss in Hochschule für Musik Basel – he gets a Master's degree in music pedagogy and a Master's degree specialized in contemporary music. Along with his instrumental studies, he attends composition lessons by Michael Jarrell and Luis Naon in Haute École de Musique de Genève and by Georg Friedrich Haas in Basel.
He is also selected to attend the IRCAM Cursus 2015-2016 in Paris.
As a composer, he has a wide range of commissions, and has composed, to name only a few, for l'Orchestre de Chambre de Genève (CH), nsembles Linea and Proxima Centauri (F), Phoenix, Vortex, soyuz21, Batida (CH), Duo AKMI, pianist Cédric Pescia, recorder player Antonio Politano or trombone player Mike Svoboda.
His Music in played throughout Europe, but also in Russia, Australia and South America, in festivals such as Label Suisse, Rümlingen (CH), Mixtur (ES), Remusik (RU), Musik Biennale Zagreb (HR), Impuls Festival (AT) or International Saxophone Congress and Festival.
His works are published by Éditions Alphonse Leduc Paris, BabelScores and Note en Bulle.
He wins 3rd prize at 5-Minute Opera Competition in Zagreb in 2015 and becomes finalist in 2nd Mauricio Kagel composition competition Vienna in 2013.
Kevin Juillerat teaches music theory in Switzerland and regularly gives saxophone, composition, improvisation and contemporary music interpretation classes.
Werkliste
Arabesque I (2008)
Besetzung: for piano solo
This piece is the first of a four-piece serie called Arabesque. The title refers to a harmonic concept that I developed : a harmony described by several voices with a slow and continuous motion which trace lines of varying thickness through the acoustic space.
Dauer: 5' 00" Manuskript
Arabesque II : yán lùn zì yóu (2008)
Besetzung: for tenor sax, piano and 3 percussions
This piece is the second of a four-piece serie called Arabesque. The title refers to a harmonic concept that I developed : a harmony described by several voices with a slow and continuous motion which trace lines of varying thickness through the acoustic space.
The music of Giacinto Scelsi always fascinated me : his great work on sound material and the contemplative and at the same time dramatic character is a great source of inspiration for me. I wanted to pay a tribute to him by writing a string quartet – a field in which he excelled.
This piece is also the third of a four-piece serie called Arabesque. The title refers to a harmonic concept that I developed : a harmony described by several voices with a slow and continuous motion which trace lines of varying thickness through the acoustic space. I also tried to make the four instrument merge in one unique polychrome sound entity.
Besetzung: for 2 bassoons or 2 baritone saxophones
This piece is the third of a four-piece serie called Arabesque. The title refers to a harmonic concept that I developed : a harmony described by several voices with a slow and continuous motion which trace lines of varying thickness through the acoustic space. I also tried to make the two instrument merge in one unique polychrome sound entity.
Two main ideas are the basis of this piece : spacialisation as a dominant musical and expressive parameter, and the development of a kind of primitive live-electronics music. Thus four similar electric sound sources (four razors or something of the same kind) are controlled by switches at the foot of the percussionist. Three of them are specialized on stage and the last one is inside the udu. Therefrom a dramaturgy grows, dealing with the specialization of the sources (simulated moves) and its links with the percussion. These relationships evolve throughout the piece, very schematically from independence to fusion. The piece has a strong theatrical and ritual aspect. It directs a percussionist trying to tame this persistent and moving sound with his udu.
Another aspect of the piece is the mixing of a ethnic percussion instrument (with its history and its origin) with a modern electric sound of our day-to-day life ; how to interrelate them and create poetry with them.
Dauer: 5' 00" Manuskript
Ginkgo (...feuilles à travers les cloches...) (2011)
Besetzung: for 2 pianos and 2 percussions
I like to envision my pieces like living creatures made of sounds, shapes and colours; organic and constantly growing. Nature, (either animal, vegetal or mineral) the grandness and the fragility of its cycles and its equilibrium are for me a constant source of inspiration.
The images of the serene Gingko Biloba and of its two-lobe leaves remain in the entire piece, in its form or its instrumentation for example. The two pianos symbolize both leaves' symmetry and trunk of a sound entity with metallic or wooded changing tints, like foliage over time.
The liquid and shining impressionism of the Images and the refined and sometimes heartbreaking idiom of the last Sonates by Claude Debussy can also be found in this tribute to a great sound alchemist.
This piece is a free instrumental transcription (or amplification) of a poem by Ian Monk. It keeps its structure and its mood, and some of its syllables and consonants are amplified by the flute.
Level: 5 to 7 years of practice
Three etudes, the first about articulation, the second about playing inside the piano, and the third about resonances; they can be played together or separately.
Besetzung: for soprano, trombone, cello, piano and vibraphone
The shadow of a prelude An obsession for a few notes from an opera The faint light of a music only, in memory of two great masters of french baroque music and their so refined and moving expressivity
Besetzung: for soprano, 2 flutes, clarinet, saxophone, accordion and hackbrett
Text: Emily Dickinson
This short cycle for soprano and six instruments sets to music four poems by the American author Emily Dickinson. They deal with life, death and nature, which are recurrent themes in her poetry.
Through the four songs one can see a progress from antiphony to heterophony via polyphony. Firstly separated from the instruments, the voice intermingles more and more with them; they finally seem to merge into one single instrument. Additionally, the text stretches increasingly from a quasi-syllabic to a highly ornamented use. Thus the less understandable it becomes, the deeper one penetrates into the sound and its contemplation.
Dauer: 10' 00" Manuskript
Gawa II: Luz (2013)
Besetzung: for 2 percussions and lights
The serie Gawa is a research work, which revolves around two main concepts : on the hand, specialization as a main musical parameter and means of expression, and on the other, development of a kind of primitive mixed music.
Besetzung: for viola, tenor saxophone and ensemble (1.0.0.0. Bar.Sax. 1.1.1.0. piano perc. 1.1.1.1.1.)
Monk 2: Plouk is a musical reread of the collection of poems Plouk Town. This rough and grating social tragedy with its exhilarating formal rigor was written in french by the british author Ian Monk. The piece stages two feverish and inseparable soloists in a desperate fight against a brutal and oppressive instrumental ensemble. It query the room of an individual in a society which is only the shadow of its old ideals.
Dauer: 12' 00" Manuskript
Jeux (2014)
Besetzung: for baritone saxophone and cello
The idea of game in music has always fascinated me. You can find it in throughout the ages – from Machaut and Mozart to Debussy and Kurtag – and especially in baroque music with its countless contrapuntal inventions, its motivic development or its ornamentation... It is full of expression, bliss, spirit and game! In my Jeux, I try to recover those characteristics in my own language. Instead of playing with tonality, harmony and counterpoint, I use sound, space, shapes and colors to create a mosaic where the two instruments often form one single entity, sometimes are more independent but always complement.
Besetzung: for chamber orchestra (2.2.2.2 2.2.1.0. Timp. Strings)
Tombeau (…sinfonia…) is a tribute to Johann Sebastian Bach and was written as a commentary on his Brandenburg Concerto nr.1. I tried to integrate several aspects of Bach's writing into my musical language. To begin with, we can see there some orchestration processes : constant changes of instrumentation which divide the form and alternations between tutti and soli parts. I also used the orchestral formation of the Concerto (horns, oboes, bassoon, solo violin and strings) to get a characteristic trace which can stand out against the full orchestra color. Another main feature of Bach's language is the canon. This process can be found in different layers in the piece, notably in its central section where it occurs in the field of orchestration and dynamics. Furthermore, some musical gestures and ornaments which are characteristic to barock music are widespread in the entire work. Finally, the whole harmonic and melodic material is derived from Bach's score, especially from a few bars of the second movement. This raw material is stretched and transformed continuously. It emerges in its initial form only surreptitiously just before the end of the piece, as if the whole music would converge into this fragile souvenir.
Dauer: 5' 00" Manuskript
Les Nuits de Bilitis (2015-2016)
Besetzung: for voice quartet and electric guitar
Text: Pierre Louÿs
Lyrics from "Chansons de Bilitis" by Pierre Louÿs
Lorsque ses Chansons de Bilitis sont publiées en 1894, Pierre Louÿs prétend qu'elle ne sont que de simples traductions de poèmes écrits par une jeune fille grecque au VIe siècle avant notre ère. Il révélera un peu plus tard la supercherie et admettra qu'il est lui-même l'auteur de ces poèmes érotiques. À l'image de cette poésie antique contrefaite et moderne, le court cycle "Les Nuits de Bilits" est une musique antique imaginaire et contemporaine. S'appuyant sur les textes de Louÿs, sa distribution instrumentale symbolise ici leur anachronisme : quatre voix, instrument universel précédant tous les autres, et la guitare électrique, instrument emblématique de ces dernières décennies. L'érotisme est également central dans l'oeuvre et se manifeste à différents niveaux : dans les textes utilisés bien évidemment, mais également dans sa conception harmonique et mélodique (outils d'une expression toujours très intense, presque charnelle) ainsi que dans ses sonorités et leur résonance dans l'imaginaire collectif – de l'intimité de la voix humaine aux sons distordus de la guitare évoquant la culture populaire rock, elle-même souvent associée à une sexualité débridée.
Dauer: 7' 00" Manuskript
Les Chants de l'Eubage (2015)
Besetzung: for soprano, piano, violin, viola and cello
Text: Blaise Cendrars
Lyrics from "l'Eubage" by Blaise Cendrars
Écrit par Blaise Cendrars en 1917, "L'Eubage – aux antipodes de l'Unité" est le récit d'un voyage poétique et fantasque dans l'espace, aux allures de parabole initiatique. L'intrigue n'y est que peu détaillée : nous ne savons presque rien sur les circonstances ou le but du voyage, ni sur l'identité des voyageurs. Par un départ inespéré, le narrateur (l'eubage) et son équipage quittent la terre pour explorer l'hinterland du ciel. Après quelques étapes, ils parviennent à l'Origine, puis l'eubage revient seul sur terre, car ses hommes sont morts en route. Le récit est découpé en douze chapitres portant chacun comme titre l'un des mois de l'année. Entre astronomie et astrologie, ce texte à première vue insolite et obscur est truffé de symboles. De nombreuses références à la guerre y sont faites (le récit commence notamment en mars – dieu de la guerre dans la mythologie romaine), mais aussi à la biographie de l'auteur et à la genèse de l'oeuvre ; on y décèle également toute une réflexion sur l'homme et son rapport à la science – sa maladresse et son ignorance. Dans "Les Chants de l'Eubage", sept chapitres du texte de Cendrars sont mis en musique sous forme d'un cycle de Lieder. Les extraits choisis sont les plus descriptifs de l'oeuvre, se prêtant mieux à la forme poétique du Lied que d'autres passages dominés par l'intrigue. C'est une musique stellaire et fantasque, à l'image du texte dont elle amplifie l'étrangeté et la poésie.
Dauer: 21' 00" Manuskript
Jeux (hi-lo-hi-mute) (2015)
Besetzung: for accordion and percussion
The idea of game in music has always fascinated me. You can find it in throughout the ages – from Machaut and Mozart to Debussy and Kurtag – and especially in baroque music with its countless contrapuntal inventions, its motivic development or its ornamentation... It is full of expression, bliss, spirit and game!
In my Jeux for accordion and percussion, I try to recover those characteristics in my own language. Instead of playing with tonality, harmony and counterpoint, I use sound, space, shapes and colors to create a mosaic where the two instruments often form one single entity, sometimes are more independent but always complement.
i. Nature morte for glockenspiel
ii. Besogneux souffleur for alto saxophone
iii. Petit extra for accordion
iv. À blanc for baritone saxophone
v. Douces pédales for harp
vi. Saxfest for sopranino saxophone
vii. Boules for bass tom
Dauer: 8' 00" Manuskript
Pas de deux (2016)
Besetzung: for guitar and electronics
impossible and whimsical duet – games of power, of imitation, complementarity, of contamination, of domination
contradictory music – explosive and intimate, resonant and muffled, bright and rough
captured, infiltrated, escaped; fleeing sounds.
Dauer: 7' 00" Manuskript
Tombeau (...kammer...) (2016-2017)
Besetzung: for 13 instruments
György Ligeti in memoriam
music of colors,
of excess –
polyphonic or monolithic;
a few notes from chamber concert
as thread –
subliminal,
shadow and genome;
rooms, spaces, compartment
resonant;
tomb.
Dauer: 10' 00" Manuskript
La chute (2016)
Besetzung: for 8 singers, sampler and jazz orchestra
This piece is first at all a tribute to Mikhaïl Bulgakov and his masterwork " The Master and Margarita " whose exuberant madness and sublime romanticism inspired the whole composition. But it is also a homage to Classical and Romantic tradition of the Sonata for piano accompanied by an other instrument such as Brahms's piano and clarinet or Beethoven's piano and cello sonatas.