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Keiko Murakami: "We wanted to build deeper, more vibrant collaborations between those who write music and those who play it".
Flute, piano and saxophone. This is the unusual line-up of the L'Imaginaire ensemble, created in 2009 by students at the Strasbourg Conservatoire, a fertile breeding ground for musical projects dedicated to creation! We spoke to flutist Keiko Murakami about this ensemble, whose name is as poetic as it is militant.
Choosing a name is often quite a task for a young ensemble. Why "L'Imaginaire"?
This term has a collective as well as an individual dimension. Imagination is a powerful creative force, bringing together the most scattered, fragmented and intimate ideas until they take the form of a collective work. In our case, a musical work. It's a precious process, and one we defend. I love Gaston Bachelard's quote: "The Imaginary is in the human psyche the very experience of openness, the very experience of novelty." This, I believe, is precisely what an ensemble like ours, which champions new and contemporary music, is all about. This appetite for the new, this curiosity, is an integral part of the human experience. In fact, it's often what makes it worthwhile. As a musical ensemble, we present opportunities to experience the new, and to create a terrain for sharing. After our anniversary concert to celebrate the ensemble's 10th birthday in 2019, we handed out flower seeds. A small symbolic gesture, but one that speaks volumes: the concert doesn't stop at the end of the show, there's a wake, an echo of this experience.
Flute, piano and saxophone: why did you choose these three instruments?
When we created L'Imaginaire in 2009, we also had a percussionist with us. Back then - and it's still true today! - we dreamed of a space that would be a laboratory, where performers and composers would be allowed to take their time. A small luxury... The economic system of contemporary music functions essentially according to the following logic: the composer receives a commission, the ensemble receives the score, and we give the concert. We wanted and needed to build deeper, more vibrant collaborations between those who write music and those who play it. We had to create a whole repertoire for our workforce, and that meant calling on composers. Today, we have a catalog of some 80 works. The anniversary year was a very busy one, with over 23 commissions! A fine harvest of new pieces...
What is your approach to composers?
The idea, once again, is not to receive the score once it's finished - quite the contrary! We meet the composer very early in the writing process, even before he has written a single note. We test ideas together, we instrumentalists show sounds or ideas we like... It's all too rare for creators to have the opportunity to test their ideas like this, with musicians. It's invaluable for them, and for us, it's practically tailor-made music, forcing us to try out new things, over and over again, on our instruments that we might otherwise know by heart. The interpretation is different, more committed, when the musicians have participated in the development of the work. That's why we organize several workshops throughout the year.
What do you think is the best way to introduce audiences to today's music?
We're lucky to be based in Strasbourg. It's extremely stimulating: audiences are waiting! Between two editions of the Musica festival, lots of ensembles have their season, set up joint projects... We dialogue and collaborate with other ensembles: this kind of approach is the future, the future of the profession.
Our mission - and not the least important one - is to break the cliché of austere contemporary music. We have to reach out to people instead of waiting for them to come to us. Having a season in a town is invaluable because, in people's minds, you're associated with a place. You have to create a place where people can share, with a convivial atmosphere around the concert. All this is far from anecdotal. We do morning concerts, for example, at 11am, followed by an aperitif with a local association: you can't hesitate to call on local players, to showcase their know-how... This network is like a sort of open community, which is growing. We never hesitate to talk during the concert either; composers present their works. We don't hide our laboratory; on the contrary, we open it up! We show the creative process, because that's what today's music is all about. At the same time, we have to create a high quality of concentration and listening.
To conclude this interview: There's more water than prévuon France Musique, a creation by Patricia Alessandrini performed on flute by Keiko Murakami, composer and former student at the Strasbourg Conservatoire:
Interview by Suzanne Gervais
Keiko Murakami's playlist
