Perrey, Jean-jacques
Prelude Au Sommeil (clear)
Repress of 300 copies on clear vinyl. One of the pioneers of musique concrète and electronic tape manipulation, 'Prélude Au Sommeil' is Perrey's debut recording but shows a composer already at maturity. Originally released at the end of the fifties, as a private press under the fake institutional name "Institut Dormiphone", it consisted of 2 side-long tracks played on the Ondioline (a vacuum-tube based, spring-loaded electronic instrument). The music contained in this mysterious vinyl is like something between dreamy church organ hymns and the keyboard-based minimalism that Philip Glass and Terry Riley developed a decade later. It was intended as sleep-inducing and tranquilizing for use in mental hospitals. It is unclear if the copies pressed actually had been distributed to mental hospitals or if the whole story was just a fantastical joke on the part of Mr. Perrey. Essential.