Joute

Joute, dialogue pour piano et orgue attempts to highlight both the complementary nature of the two keyboard instruments, as well as their opposites.
That’s why the title is a double one: Joute offers the notion of combat, and dialogue suggests the idea of two elements conversing.
There’s no doubt that the nervousness of the work and the alternations between the two instruments reflect the title, with its almost omnipresent idea of
one-upmanship. The instruments converse and speak out more and more, to the point of cutting off each other’s interventions, then expressing themselves
both at the same time. Only at one point in the piece is there a moment of calm, as if the two could no longer hear each other. Then the tone rises again
until the end, when the two instruments measure themselves against each other.
The musical progressions are governed by the construction of a sinogram. Indeed, my work revolves around the relationship between calligraphy and
music, or how to derive musical form and elements of all kinds through an ideogram. In this work, the Chinese character used is 对话 (duìhuà),
meaning «dialogue». Each line is drawn in a precise order, and offers a specific curvature. This also makes it possible to build progressions in which the
musical equivalents of each stroke are superimposed, creating a continuous expansion.
No registrations are specified, so that the organist can adapt them to suit the instrument at hand and the balance with the piano. The organ is thus
conceived in terms of sound and dynamics.

Grégoire Rolland