Abstract: Un des aspects les plus prospectifs de la relation instrument/machine réside dans le développement des moyens d’analyse acoustique des sons instrumentaux et vocaux en temps réel que l’on appelle descripteurs audio. Le nombre de ces descripteurs ne cesse de s’accroître au fil du temps : centroid, spread, skewness, kurtosis, roll-off,fundamental frequency, noisiness, inharmonicity, odd-to-even energy ratio, deviation, loudness, roughness, … Ces termes désignent des attributs du son que l’on n’a découverts que récemment. Notre connaissance du son se complexifie. L’extraction de paramètres constitutifs du son en vue de leur utilisation en tant qu’éléments compositionnels permet de créer une cohérence musicale entre les sons acoustiques et les sons électroniques. Cependant, seul un petit nombre de ces descripteurs sont aujourd’hui réellement adaptés aux impératifs musicaux réels. Le perfectionnement de ces descripteurs est un axe de recherche indispensable si l’on souhaite réduire encore l’écart qui sépare le monde instrumental de celui des sons électroniques.

Bio: Allergic to academic studies and a sworn autodidact, Philippe Manoury presented his first compostions to Gérard Condé who introduced him to Max Deutsch, a former student of Arnold Schoenberg. He initially studied composition at the École normale de musique de Paris where he also worked on harmony and counterpoint before going on to study at the Cnsmdp under Ivo Malec, Michel Philippot (composition), and Claude Ballif (analysis). It is the premiere of Cryptophonos performed by the pianist Claude Helffer at the Metz Festival in 1974 that introduced the public to Manoury’s works. In 1978, he moved to Brazil where he taught classes and conferences on contemporary music in a number of universities (Sao Paulo, Brasilia, Rio de Janeiro, Salvador). In 1981, Manoury returned to France where he was a guest researcher at IRCAM. Since this era, he has continued to be a part of the activities at the institute, as a composer or as a professor. At IRCAM Manoury developed a range of research in the domain of real-time interaction between acoustic instruments and new technologies in connection with computer-music in collaboration with the mathematician Miller Puckette. From this work, his series of interactive works for a range of instruments was born: Sonus ex machina, comprenant Jupiter, Pluton, La Partition du Ciel et de l’Enfer, and Neptune. From 1983 to 1987, Philippe Manoury was the head of Education with the Ensemble intercontemporain. He was a composition and electronic music professor at the CNSMD de Lyon from 1987 to 1997. After numerous residencies in diverse institutions in France and abroad, Philippe Manoury decided in 2004 to divide his time between Europe and the United States where he teaches composition at the University of California San Diego.