Les Projectionnistes

Montréal trombonist, composer, and bandleader Claude St-Jean was mainly known as the leader of rollicking alternative brass band L'Orkestre des Pas Perdus when he formed Les Projectionnistes in 1996. A harder-edged ensemble that retained L'Orkestre des Pas Perdus' propulsive momentum and memorable charts, Les Projectionnistes added a dose of electric rock energy, thanks in large part to the presence of electric guitarist Bernard Falaise of Miriodor, a rising star on the Montréal avant music scene. Shortly after its inception, Les Projectionnistes began playing St-Jean's compositions in accompaniment to silent films and slides, and was invited by Cinématheque Québecoise to perform live improvisations along with classic silent films at Rencontres de Musique Actuelle at Montréal's Usine C Theatre. Live music and silent film shows were subsequently presented by the band at the Montréal and Toronto Jazz Festivals in 1997. Les Projectionnistes found itself developing two sets of repertoire: compositions from the band's earliest days and pieces developed from its improvisational forays accompanying the silent films of directors like Fritz Lang, Man Ray, and Marcel Duchamps. This dichotomy is very much in evidence on Les Projectionnistes' debut Ambiances Magnétiques recording, Copie Zéro, released in 1999; the CD is comprised mainly of four- to seven-minute pieces, most penned by St-Jean, that mix brass band, avant-jazz, and hard rock stylings, but there is also an 11-and-one-half-minute track, recorded live in 1997 at the Usine C as the band improvised its accompaniment to a 1924 surrealist film by Fernand Léger. Les Projectionnistes maintained a fairly active live performance schedule in the late '90s and early 2000s. In the fall of 2001, the band hit the road to perform a new program of St-Jean compositions entitled Naive Music and Other Paradoxes, with performances across Canada and in Ann Arbor, MI. An extended Les Projectionnistes ensemble, featuring the core quintet (St-Jean, Falaise, drummer Rémi Leclerc, saxophonist/flutist Pierre Labbé, and bassist Tommy Babin) supplemented by sousaphonist Jean Sabourin and saxophonist Roberto Murray from L'Orkestre des Pas Perdus, was convened to realize St-Jean's newest compositional output.
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