Francis Dhomont

Francis Dhomont was one of electro-acoustic music's most innovative composers. The majority of his work consists of natural sounds manipulated using tape and transformed into vast, evocative soundscapes. He created many acousmatic works playing on sound and meaning, but his best results were obtained through the use of dreamlike narratives and "cinema for the ear." Gifted with a sense of the narrative that has never been matched, he was able to tell captivating tales through acousmatic art. His Cycle of Depths works, including the albums Sous le Regard d'un Soleil Noir (1981) and Foret Profonde (1996), remain some of the most enduring examples of musique concrète, transcending the genre to touch the core of mankind. He has continued issuing collections of his newer compositions well into the 21st century, including ...Et Autres Utopies (2006) and Le Cri du Choucas (2016), the third part of the Cycle of Depths series. Born in 1926 in Paris, Francis Dhomont came to musique concrète through classical music. He studied with Ginette Waldmeier, Charles Koechlin, and Nadia Boulanger. Working with magnetic wire and essentially stumbling upon musique concrète at about the same time Pierre Schaeffer did, he abandoned musical composition around 1963 to create only electro-acoustic music. Little is known of his works before 1972, as the composer repudiated them. Splitting his time between France and Canada, he began teaching electro-acoustic composition at the Université de Montreal in 1980. Sous le Regard d'un Soleil Noir, issued by the Parisian electro-acoustic organization INA-GRM in 1981, introduced him to a relatively larger audience -- the album became a classic of the genre and a source of inspiration for many sound artists. Dhomont co-founded the Canadian Electroacoustic Community in 1986. His various compositions throughout the '80s, including "Points de Fuite" (1982) and "Chiaroscuro" (1987), garnered numerous awards and prizes; Dhomont won the Bourges International Electroacoustic Music Competition five times, and received their Magisterium award in 1988. Dhomont continued to be highly active throughout the '90s, when his work grew even more evocative. The Canadian label Empreintes DIGITALes began issuing his work, starting with 1991's double-CD Mouvances - Métaphores (later released as two separate discs, Cycle de l'Errance and Les Dérives du Signe). This was followed by the 60-minute piece Foret Profonde (issued in 1996), a fantasy reading of fairy tales using the works of Bruno Bettelheim. Frankenstein Symphony, composed using samples of compositions by several of Dhomont's friends and students, including Robert Normandeau and Martin Tétreault, was issued by Asphodel in 1997. Aside from his recordings, Dhomont was also very active as a theorist. He edited several issues of magazines on electro-acoustic music (L'Espace du Son, Circuit), and created radio programs for Radio-Canada and Radio France. In February 2001, he received a career grant (60,000 dollars Canadian over two years) from the Conseil des Arts et Lettres du Quebec, an incredible achievement for an avant-garde artist. He continued producing audio as well as video works, and Empreintes DIGITALes released additional CDs of his compositions, including Jalons (2003), ...Et Autres Utopies (2006), and Études Pour Kafka (2009). A one-sided picture disc titled Birthdays was released by Beniffer Editions in 2012. Le Cri du Choucas, the third installment of the Cycle of Depths series, appeared in 2016. Francis Dhomont died on December 28, 2023, at the age of 97.
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