)
Anyone who has met guitarist Yaron Deutsch once in their life will never forget him. This is a musician whose passion consumes him, and who is driven by the fire of discovery!
Last season, he knocked on Radio France's door, proposing to create three pieces for France Musique's "Création Mondiale" program. These three pieces reflect Nikel's repertoire: they are three worlds, at opposite ends of the spectrum. Indeed, there is little in common between the music of Austrian Klaus Lang, Frenchman Sylvain Marty and American Matthew Shlomowitz, associated with Irish composer Jennifer Walshe in a four-hand creation. Nikel likes to play with great differences, or let's say "a form of controlled eclecticism", in the words of Yaron Deutsch.
Nikel also has a dual sonic identity, which comes from his instrumental colors: electric guitar, piano and/or keyboards, saxophone, drums and/or percussion.
This is where "Janus" comes in. Nikel's identity is indeed twofold: behind the rock band lies the contemporary music ensemble, or maybe it's the other way around...
Movement after movement, let's enter Nikel's multiple lives!
Overture: composers' points of view, with Jennifer Walshe and Sylvain Marty.
Jennifer, you collaborated with Nikel for the first time last May, recording with them "Minor Characters", five pieces co-composed with your London friend Matthew Shlomowitz. In your opinion, what is the band's sonic identity?
Jennifer Walshe: You could say there's this sort of fundamental rock sound, because of the electric guitar played by Yaron and Brian's drums, but it's also because the part Matthew composed for Brian in "Minor Characters" uses drums, which isn't always the case in music played by Nikel.
Brian and Matthew share a common rock and punk culture; they've played this music, so they bring with them specific gestures on drums and percussion. It's very present in the band, it's even the essence of Nikel for me: it's almost a form of band philosophy.
Sylvain, what do you like about Nikel's work and sound?
Sylvain Marty: I like a lot of things, but above all I like the spirit of the musicians, the way they approach their instruments. Things are really open. You can suggest a lot of things; they really push the envelope. They are very receptive to writing proposals which, for my part, often go far in terms of verticality, positioning and succession of playing modes. We also have musical affinities. I like what they do, their choice of composers. Finally, it's a group that takes me back to my origins.
Percussion, piano and saxophone are instruments with which I've improvised a lot in the past, as well as the guitar. These are sounds I've had in me too, or in any case that are close to me. It was obvious when we met!
Development, or when Nikel tells his story in four voices
Voice 1: Yaron Deutsch, guitarist
Yaron, when you founded this group in 2006, the original idea was to play totally new pieces, which meant discovering composers and commissioning them. Over the years, Nikel has built up a close relationship and loyalty with certain composers.
The band's sound has undoubtedly evolved too: how would you define it today?
Yaron: You can't escape the band's sound. Nikel is a fusion of electronic and acoustic sound sources, from the moment saxophone, piano, percussion and electric guitar are brought together - and now also synthesizers and drums. Nikel also offers a fusion of aesthetics and psychological references. Each brings his or her own background and sensibility to the group.
You could say that Nikel is like a new cognitive model in today's music. Maybe today, when we say "quartet", we don't just think "string quartet". I hope this can change people's minds!
I like the idea that by creating new sound combinations, we can help our musical vocabulary evolve. The mixed color of our quartet attracts the attention of composers with whom we collaborate on a regular basis.
The mixing of universes and traditions is more or less strong depending on the country. In France, for example, this fusion is fairly widespread, thanks to the importance of the improvised and jazz scenes. This is why our collaboration with composers such as Philippe Hurel or Hugues Dufourt is so rich. Composers make the most of all these sonorities, and this passes through our instruments, before moving on to machines and electronics. It's a starting point for us, and if there's a confusion of genres, that's a good thing!
On the subject of loyalty with certain composers such as Sarah Nemtsov, Klaus Lang, Matthew Shlomowitz, Marco Momi..., I'd say it's a bit like in life! It's better to have a handful of good friends than hundreds of superficial relationships. And in fact, if I take stock of the music I've played in my "career" as a musician, I'll remember perhaps twenty or thirty composers who really count and whose music I always enjoy revisiting.
Last night, I was looking at composer James Dillon's catalog. Every four years or so, he wrote a new quartet for the Arditti (except one, I believe, which was premiered by the wonderful Quatuor Diotima). I like to think this was probably at the request of the musicians. I can just see Irvine Arditti calling James Dillon and saying: "Mr. Dillon, another quartet, please!
Because it's also a human adventure?
Yaron: Yes, and it's built up over time, just like friendships.
How did the band evolve?
Yaron: At the beginning, I wondered a lot about Nikel's aesthetic. There was this question: is the aesthetic the style of the music, or does it have to do with the way you play, the quality of your playing? It's a real question! One of the main objectives for me as a founding musician of Nikel is to find a balance between the demands of playing on the one hand, and an eclecticism of musical languages on the other, which is never haphazard or accidental. We choose composers from a wide variety of backgrounds, but it's not a catch-all to get extra concerts. It's better to do fewer concerts and create a "controlled" eclecticism. I'm very attached to this idea.
As for the evolution of Nikel, I'd say we've improved on two points over the years. Our eclecticism has become clearer and more defined. We're also playing better and better. The two work together organically!
Voice 2: Patrick Stadler, saxophonist
Could you define the band's sound for us?
Patrick: It's a particular sound because of the electric guitar, the other instruments being more "conventional". The quartet's primary sound is powerful, round and warm, but it can also take other directions. We can play very finely, very subtly, very softly. When you play delicately, I like the idea that you no longer know who's playing what.
In Nikel, there are these two sides. You can play hard, but you can also play soft! We've been playing together for ten years, so we know each other, and we know what sound worlds we can create. There isn't ONE group sound, there are several that we can refine.
Did the band put together its own repertoire?
Patrick: When Nikel was born, there was only one piece written for the group, and it was composed by Louis Andriessen. So we had to create a repertoire and place orders. We didn't have a catalog to draw on before creating the new pieces. This is quite different from the classical string quartet, where the repertoire is immense! It's very stimulating to discover the music of today's composers, wondering which of them might write for Nikel. Sometimes, certain choices don't materialize, because they don't work out. But that's part of the game!
Voice n°3 : Antoine Françoisepianist and keyboardist
For you, Antoine, does Nikel have a specific sound?
Antoine: I've been playing in the band since 2014, I came in last. In the beginning, I only played piano - I'm a classically trained pianist. Keyboards gradually came in, and I really enjoy discovering keyboards, synths, in this context. Adding an electric sound to the electric guitar through keyboards seems natural to me. I find a different place for myself!
I love this group: I play alongside three exceptional musicians with very different backgrounds. Patrick is a wonderful chamber musician in the way he breathes and sings on his instrument. I sometimes wish he were a cellist, so I could play the great sonatas with him! As for Brian, he comes from a rock background, but his classical percussion playing is insane! I know we think of music very differently, but that's exactly what I like: we look for each other and draw inspiration from each other.
As for Yaron, he's a bit of a UFO... He's taking the electric guitar to a level never seen before in written music, with a perfectionism that forces us to look ever further.
I'm perhaps the one of the four who fights the hardest against the "rock band" image that sticks to us, especially now that I'm on keyboards! I like to treat the band like a string quartet. I find it more interesting to look for that absurdity, that confusion! That's why I'm happy when we get pieces with a different approach. Nikel and I have a certain history of very "testosterone" pieces, which ended up tiring us out! And working with Jennifer Walshe, for example, who has even more energy than we do, takes us somewhere else!
As a result, we can't define anything in advance: I don't know what Nikel's sound will be like tomorrow if it comes into contact with the energies of composers and performers like Jenny!
Most contemporary music ensembles play on two fronts: the 20th century repertoire, of which they offer their own version, and new works. It's a bit different with Nikel, which does almost exclusively new works...
Antoine: Personally, I'd also like to see these two approaches developed, because today there are other groups of this type (quartet or larger formation) who have commissioned pieces that Nikel hasn't yet played. I'd be very interested in doing this work as an interpreter, taking on a score already known and played by another ensemble. So we'd become interpreters of an existing repertoire, and at the same time we'd continue to make our own the pieces we commission, which every time we play them - and we often get the chance - are a rediscovery!
I'm thinking, for example, of Enno Poppe's Fleisch, which we've played almost a hundred times in five years: nevertheless, we rediscover it every time!
Given the group's dual identity (rock and contemporary music), does Nikel ever play in venues that are labelled "rock"?
Antoine: Not necessarily! We did a job with Alexander Schubert that was really conceived as a show, with lights, smoke machines and the audience standing around with beers. But in the end, given that the world of contemporary music is fairly "closed", whatever we do, it's still the same audience that comes, even if it's projected into a different setting. It's hard to find a new audience!
I prefer to see things differently. For example, I'd love to play Rebecca Saunders or Sylvain Marty in a cellar: to bring this chamber music side, this contemporary music written in other contexts, rather than trying to belong to a context that isn't really our own, that of rock, where there are so many brilliant musicians!
Voice N°4 : Brian Archinal, drummer, percussionist
Each of Nikel's creations offers a very contrasting face of the group. For France Musique, you played Sylvain Marty's chiselled, rather "abstract" music back to back with Matthew Shlomowitz's much more pop, more rock music, in collaboration with vocalist and performer Jennifer Walshe.
Brian: That's true! Some composers sometimes like to use Nikel's instrumentation to approach a form of rock'n'roll, jazz, or let's say a musical language more popular than that of contemporary music. Matthew Shlomowitz, for example, took great pleasure in composing for this progressive band, which is a little weird and adventurous...but which also has the ability to play extreme rhythms, experimental phrasing, and plunge into sonic exploration. So we have this dual identity: we're both a rock band and a quartet in the more classical sense of the term. But what we really want is for this music to give us pleasure!
What does the adventure with Nikel mean to you?
It's an adventure I've been taking part in for ten years now. We've travelled a lot together, all over the world: South America, Oceania, Europe, the USA...
The adventure is musical, of course, but it's also human. We've met so many people from different cultures! During the years of confinement, we had to stop traveling and sharing (except via the web)... Now, the Nikel adventure can begin again, and I'm very grateful for that: I love discovering different cultures and experiencing the world. For me, this is the real adventure!
The quartet's repertoire is a work in progress. Do you create many new pieces each year?
We're delighted that our work - and we work hard - attracts programmers, that we can play at certain festivals and take part in programs devised by others. It's also great to be in contact with composers who understand our uniqueness. We're going to keep on looking, so as not to be satisfied with the "rock band" facet. We know how to do that, of course; it's second nature to us. We're keen to develop a new repertoire, to meet programmers who will help us discover new composers.
What does the Nikel sound mean to you?
Brian: Since we've been working together for a long time, we've worked out a system. We live in three different countries, and it's sometimes complicated to get together to play. But Nikel's sound is always evolving, even when we're rehearsing. That's what happened on these two recording sessions for Création Mondiale/France Musique. We felt it when we rehearsed in Bern, Switzerland, where I'm active. We've amassed so many different instruments over the years, used in the "weird" world of contemporary music! We now have a whole collection of guitar pedals and various synthesizers, all of which allow us to expand our sound palette.
In fact, this November, Nikel will be transforming itself into a kind of synthesizer band. There'll be three of us on synths - Patrick, Antoine and me - and we'll be doing what we love to do, exploring beyond our usual sounds...
Anne Montaron
CODA
Listen to three faces from Nikel's repertoire on France Musique's Création Mondiale program
° Chanson lointaine et douce by Klaus Lang for electric guitar
° Aiguilles by Sylvain Marty for four musicians
° Coming up in Création Mondiale, week of September 12: Minor Characters by Matthew Shlomowitz and Jennifer Walshe
