Gherasim Luca

Just arrived: alga marghen proudly presents an LP edition including two experimental sound works by Gherasim Luca, created in close connection to Sten Hanson who invited the Rumenian artist at Fylkingen in the very beginning of the 1970s and made him discover the possibilities of the advanced EMS electronic music studio of Stockholm. The two recordings presented here are quite unique as they are the only poems by Gherasim Luca created through the use of electronic manipulations. As Henri Chopin wrote some years later in his legendary "Poésie Sonore Internationale" book, Ghérasim Luca made a big impression at the Third Stockholm Festival in 1970. Luca was born in Bucarest in 1913. Before leaving to Israel he had a leading role among the Roumanian Surrealist group. He eventually moved to Paris where he lived untill the end of his life in 1992. Gherasim  Luca work is very personal, giving his poems a very uncommon and ironic character. Again Henri Chopin underlines that  "in his recordings, which are not many, he superimposes his very warm voice, marked by his Roumanian accent; it's a sound wonder. In fact Luca is not a sound poet. He is more a speaker who managed, without complex, to enter into the Fylkingen studio vortex. On 4 tracks and with 32 loudspeakers, thanks to his superb voice and his instinctive knowledge of the electronic studio which amplifies words, he gives great pleasure to the listener, even if the latter can not understand French".

    “Autres secrets du vide et du plein” (April 1971) and “Crimes sens initiales” (April 1972) were both recorded one track at the time on a 4 track tape and afterwards subjected to electronic treatments. They were recorded in Sweden at EMS and first performed at the 1971 and 1972 Text-Sound Festivals of Stockholm.

   Edition limited to 385 copies, also including the reproduction of a worderful drawing by Gherasim Luca on the front cover, a photo portrait of the author by Gilles Ehrmann from 1959 and an essay by Henri Chopin.