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Tom McKinney for Building a Library joins Andrew to make a personal choice from among the available recordings of Boulez's seminal work Le marteau sans maître.

Pierre Boulez first performed this piece in 1955. It sets the surrealist poetry of René Char for contralto and six instrumentalists. He had already established a reputation as the composer of modernist and serialist works and this has become one of his most enduring compositions. The orchestration allows for a continuum of sonorities. As Boulez said, "a number of features shared by these instruments forms a continuous passage from voice to vibraphone".

Recommended Recording:

MASTERWORKS OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Pierre Boulez (conductor), Yvonne Minton (mezzo-soprano), Ensemble Musique Vivante

Sony Classical 88875061902 (10 CDs – currently only available as a digital download)

Other Recommended Recordings:

Below are other recordings that Tom also liked, although we can’t guarantee the availability of these.

Pascal Gallois (conductor), Katalin Karolyi (mezzo soprano), International Contemporary Ensemble

Stradivarius STR37071 (CD)

Robert Craft (conductor), Margery MacKay (mezzo-soprano)

Odyssey 32160154 or Soundmark Records 48292 (download)

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