«Projets d’opéra» is a concerto for (amplified) violin and an 11-instrument ensemble that includes a sampler. It is the result of a commission from the Société Radio-Canada and was premiered in 2003 by Andréa Tyniec and the Ensemble contemporain de Montréal. It sports 4 main parts (Scène, Récit, Final, Épilogue) that represent the various stages of the plot of an opera that is still at its «project» state. It is a very narrative composition with the violin taking on different roles, always in front of the rest of the music that represents all the tuttis, choirs, dramatic surprises, murders and suicides you would expect in an opera.
In even more explicit terms, I consider this concerto as a timeline following the thoughts of one who wishes to conceive an opera and put these thoughts on paper in some form of a schematic description, precise and interesting enough to convince a listener of the merits of the totally hypothetical opera it is trying to “describe” (I never intended to actually compose an opera out of this process, so it is not the project of something that would one day exist). It is hence not surprising that the music zaps from one event to the other and back, or does not care about the chronology of events in general… it is constructed as if one could see and hear many scenes at the same moment.
The idea of schematically describing an imaginary opera is also underlined by the graphical style of the notation: all the pitches are omitted (this is actually the first of a series of works that use this technique). The performers get to choose the pitches, allowing them to focus on other details and quickly access to the level of virtuosity that is required (high speeds are characteristic of this piece) whilst preserving the semi-improvised ambience that tries to suggest possibilities, directions, musical environments that could host a whole operatic plot.