Bernard Vitet & Hélène Sage ‘Supposons Le Problème Résolu’

French trumpetist Bernard Vitet, born 1934, started his career in Paris jazz clubs in the 1960s, occasionally playing with visiting US musicians (Lester Young, Chet Baker). He was later associated with the French free jazz scene of the 1970s (François Tusques, Michel Portal), and joined Un Drame Musical Instantané in 1976. One of his most radical solo release was La Guêpe, published by Futura in 1972, with texts from French poet Francis Ponge. French multi-instrumentist, instrument builder and performer Hélène Sage [+] joined Un Drame Musical Instantané in the early 1980s and took part to albums A Travail Egal, Salaire Egal (1982) and Les Bons Contes Font Les Bons Amis (1983). See her track “Les Athlètes” from Bad Alchemy #4.

♫ The two surrealist keen spirits pairing on this LP could only produce highly original music. Supposons Le Problème Résolu is a large collage of field recordings, strange instruments interjections, rehearsal excerpts, casual conversations and any kind of awkward sounds. Each side features extensive reading from found texts (encyclopedia, criminal files, newspaper, etc) declaimed with poise and composure by both artists, but also multiple backward running tapes and modified reed instruments, such as trumpet played with a garden hose. The result is akin to a Hörspiel and closer to Nurse With Wound than French free jazz. The back cover shows a picture of Stéphane Mallarmé’s groundbreaking 1897 book Un Coup de Dés, the touchstone of all collage and aleatoric artworks to come.

Supposons Le Problème Résolu
01 Side 1 (22:35)
02 Side 2 (18:26)

Total time 41:01
LP released by GRRR, GRRR 1008, France, 1984

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