If anyone has the spare time, could any French-speakers here translate this article into English for me?

Radiohead meets their idols: Johnny Greenwood hangs at the home of the legendary Jeanne Loriod, sister-in-law of Oliver Messiaen, and a (still-green??) musician. They talked about the Ondes-Martenot together, a forgotten instrument that she's played (and has defended?) for a long time.

[this next bit i don't quite understand, it's something like] As a young fan, Johnny went to look for (guidance? councils?) before speaking of his admiration and his love for the lady of the instrument.

Radiohead and Messiaen, an association at once improbable, almost surrealist. The group has accustomed us, however, to these incongrous meetings, that stretch and explode cliches and genres. Johnny Greenwood held a meeting with Jean Loriod, Messiaen's sister-in-law, decorated musician, and grand priestess of the Ondes-Martnenot - a futuristic instrument worthy of Marsipulami (??) and invented in France at the beginning of the 20th century, the dream-dashboard [heh maybe?] of synthesizers. Ondes-Martenots were used a lot by Oliver Messiaen, most notably in his Turanga-Lila Symphony. Their sound also showed up a lot in 50s science-fiction movies.

The meeting happened in Paris, at Ms Loriod's house [yes, we know that] : Johnny arrived with a bouquet of flowers in his hand, a slightly nervous air about him, like a fan finally meeting his idol. He spent the night preparing for this interview -- [here i can go no further]

I just read it. Oh my GAWD Radiohead is going polka!

I think ?this picture is beautiful for a variety of reasons. It was just so well thought-out and sensitively done. There's so much one could read into it. (the gray bar in the center is there because the fold of the magazine concealed a portion of the picture)

. . . to revise his classics: his features were lightly drawn and he had carried by hand the apprentice method for the Ondes Martenot, written by the lady.

"My hovercraft is full of eels."

All right. I am having my lazy Sunday morning so I will do this, but since it is my lazy Sunday, I can't look up everything, so I will leave a few words in brackets, I don't know them off the top of my head..

Greenwood's intro:
Generally, the first thing that people tell you about the Ondes Martenont, is that it's an old thing that uses electricity: these are its least important characteristics, because they reduces the invention to a simple [chainon - link?] in the evolution of electronic instruments, from their prehistory all the way up to... To what, exactly? To Casio keyboards? To samplers?
No, for since the beginning, Mr. Martenot was right. Electronic instruments, since their invention, evolved in this way: from more and more sounds controlled in a more and more [efficient ?] manner. Today even samplers are no more than a sort of super [orgue - organ?]. While with the Ondes Martenont, you can control each particular aspect of sound - its color, its tonality, its intensity - and thus play, grow in [pique] or [gronder], with as much versatility and precision as a violin.
By comparison, even the Theremin is just a toy. The first time that I heard the Ondes Martenot, I was 15 years old, it was in a recording of the Turangalia-Symphonie by Mesiaen. The sublime sound of the Ondes carried the violins out into the space (listen to this work and you'll see what I mean). Since that day, I've been obsessed with the Ondes. So I was very honored to meet Ms. Loriod, the greatest Ondes Martenot player in the wolrd (it was she who played on the famous recording of the Turangalia-Symphonie). She's since been, for the last half-century, a central figure in contemporary French music. I had the good fortune to be able to ask her some questions about her life, her work with Messiaen and the future of this remarkable instrument.

(still-green??) = evergreen = perennial(?)

[Yes, this is a quick and dirty translation. My apologies, don't have time for a super good one!.]
Radiohead meeting their idols: Jonny Greenwood visits the venerable Jeanne Loriod, [half-sister/sister-in-law - I think sister-in-law, actually] of Olivier Messien and (still youthful) musician. Together, they talked about the Ondes Martenot, a forgotten instrument that she has played and defended for quite a long time. As a young fan, Jonny had come to ask for advice, before expressing his admiration and his love for the musician and the instrument.

---
Radiohead and Messiaen: A priori, an improbable, almost surrealist association. Nevertheless, the group has made us used to such incongruous encounters, that focus in on & destroy cliches and genre boundaries. Jonny Greenwood wanted to meet Jeanne Loriod, half-sister of Messiaen and passionnate musician, expert player of the Ondes Martenot, that futuristic instrument worthy of Marsupilami, invented in France at the beginning of the 20th century and precursor of the synthesizer. The Ondes Martenont had been frequently used by Olivier Messiaen, notably in his Turangalia-Symphonie. Its sound had also been popularized by the science fiction films of the 1950s.
The meeting took place in Paris, at Mme Loriod's: Jonny arrived with a bouquet of flowers in his hand, with a slightly anxious air about him, like a fan finally meeting his idol. He had spent the night preparing his interview, revisiting classic works [??]: his features were [legerement tires] and he had at hand the learning method for the Ondes Martenot written by Mme. Loriod. The meeting went like a musician's dream: in spite of the difference in generations and languages, the two communicated through a shared sense of the marvellous and fanatastic, the same dreams nourished by Messiaen. Through his admiration for Jeanne Loriod and her preferred instrument, Jonnny also spoke of his amazement before the composer's work. After the interview, he confided, happily: "Two years ago, she played in London and I went to see her at the [bar/]backstage, before the show. She was afraid and left. I suppose that I've already done that as well to certain Radiohead fans..."

pique = brightness or sharpness?
gronder = hum, whirr, grind, buzz, some semi-onomatopoeic verb like this?

(this is based on knowing abt the ondes martenot but only guessing the french)

yay daria
[chainon] = link
[etroite] = strict/limited
[orgue] = organ
[et ainsi chanter, monter en piqué ou gronder, avec] = and thus sing, rise in staccato [roughly: this is probably "bursts of staccato" or something not-exactly-translatable] or growl, with...

bold intro -

radiohead meet their idols : j.greenwood met with the venerable j.loriod, stepsister of o.messiaen and still in her musical youth. together, they discussed the ondes martenot, a forgotten instrument which loriod has practiced and defended for ages. jonny arrived as a young fan seeking counsel, before [/and left] proclaiming his respect and his love for the lady and her instrument.

J.G. - What was your first contact with the Ondes Martenot?

J.L. - Maurice Martenot invented the instrument and presented it in Paris on May 3 1928. I hadn't been born yet. But I heard it for the first time in 1937: it made an extraordinary sound! I was just a little girl and I asked my parents to explain to me what that sound was that came from the Eiffel Tower... At that time, there was an orchestra of 8 or 9 Ondes Martenots that played at the Eiffel Tower, and I think it was Maurice Martenot's sister, Ginette Martenot, who directed the ensemble..

J.G. - Adolphe Sax also gave his name to an instrument that he invented. Nevertheless, that instrument, used by composers like Berlioz or Saint-Saens, had been used for other kinds of music than that for which it was invented: it was jazz rather than classical music that made the saxophone popular.

J.L. - The Africans had understood right away that they could blow into it and make extraordinary sounds with it. Maurice Martenot, himself, still quite young, was fascinated and stunned by electricity, by sparks or flashes, everything electric. He was so fascinated that he could've said to his parents, "Me, I want to listen to music that comes from silence." Is that what he had created? His instrument, in any case, is silent, his music comes from silence, because it's permitted by electricity...

J.G. - What about the Ondes Martenot attracted Messiaen ?

J.L. - The extraordinary musicality that one can get from it, and above all, the unreal sound that floated over the entire orchestra. It was an original/unique sound that no one had ever heard before. He, who was Catholic, he really thought that when in heaven he'd hear that sound.

J.G. - The first time that I heard Messiaen's music, I was 16, it was at school and I had a very intense experience when listening to his Turangalia-Symphonie: I saw colors and vibrant images. And flying about the other instruments, I heard the Ondes Martenot which floated above the chords: their sound fascinated me right away. I've really been obsessed by this instrument for a long time and I finally found one last year in France. It's a modern version, made by the grandson of M. Martenot. You yourself, how did you meet Messiaen?

J.L. - I knew Messaien when he returned from captivity [?] in 1940 because my sister Yvonne was in his harmonics class at the Conservatory. And my sister, back then, was much encouraged by our famous aunt Nelly, she taught my sister music. And she notably asked my sister to play the Preludes of Messiaen who, returning from Germany, came to hear my sister play. In 1945, I went to the premiere of the 'Trois Petites Liturgies de la presence divine' which was played at the old Conservatory.

J.G. - When I was a teenager, I had this obsessive thought: I wanted to follow the Turangalilia-Symphonie everywhere it was played, like one follows someone one loves. I went to see you play it in London, two years ago, with Andrew Davis.

J.L. - I play it everywhere. The music was very well received. I also played it in Russia, I didn't like communism but the RUssian people are marvellous. Every four years, they organize a festival of French music, and I went to it each time, in 1974 and in 1989, to play Messiaen or __rese. [Article cut off here!].

No problem. It's a bit ugly sounding, I know, but a fun exercise. Thanks for filling in the gaps.

But Mel, the article, if you'll notice the second scanned page, second column, is chopped a bit - is there another scan available? It is hard to decipher.

[captivity = messaien was in a german prison camp at the start of WW2, it's where he wrote the quartet to the end of time]

[Actually, I think I can decipher it well enough.]

J.L. - I travelled a lot with Messaien and my sister Yvonne, who were married in 1965. It was in Australia that Messiaen recorded those famous birds. It was the moment at which he wrote his opera, Saint Francis of Assisi. He got up at 3am to listen to the [lyre bird?], a rare bird that one doesn't find in Europe but which he recorded for his compositions.

J.G. - For me, the Ondes Martenot has a sound that's very joyful and mysterious at the same time, like Messaien's music. What I like is that the sound is very close to the human voice, it's the instrument that most approximates it, more than the flute or the [hauthe..? cut off]. When the instrument came out, lots of contemporary music composers or electronic music composers pushed it aside because they might have found it too lyrical, too musical, and so they didn't take to it.

J.L. - I think that this instrument was like a revolution. And as always, the French don't know how to recognize innovators/creators. Charpentier composed for the Ondes. Jolivet also, in 1931 he composed a magnificent piece, "De --- incantatoire." Varese wrote "Equatoriales": he composed it for Theremin[?] and he retranscribed it for the Ondes Martinot. Pierre Henry and Pierre Schaeffer weren't [aware? cut off]. Schaeffer, he was an extraordinary man, but he wanted to do something else, he wanted to use noise, the most noise possible. He was less of a musician. Pierre Henry, just the same.

J.G. - You've played in many genres and many places [domaines].

J.L. - After the war, I learned the metier right away, in playing [varietes] for Edith [Piaf - I assume, cut off here] and Tino Rossi, with some very good singers. I also played jazz and lots of film music, but I don't remember that very well. With Joseph Kosma, or Maurice Ja___ and Pierre Boulez, who were Jean Louis Barrault's musicians. Barrault, he was wonderful. And in fact I replaced Pierre Boulez, who also played the Ondes Martenot, he was in fact the one who made it well known. I replaced him at the Marigny theater. As a musician, I also worked a lot for Unesco. They projected the films of images shot all over the world and I played improvisations: I made the soundtrack. The Ondes Martenot is an instrument typically used for improvisation, like the organ.

J.G. - How did you see composition for the Ondes Martenot develop?

J.L. - It depended, in fact, on the evolution of the instrument. At the beginning it was a little box, to which Martenot attached the drawing of a keyboard for finding his place: he made a worldwide tour with his little box... He had Ravel listen to his music, who said to him, "It's a marvellous sound. It's fantastic [fantastique], but the keyboard must be able to vibrate." And that's how Martenot, in 1937, invented the keyboard for the instrument.

J.G. - Reading your method, I came to recognize your enthusiasm for the instrument, enthusiasm shared by your students. What should be done today with this instrument, that I think is the most important one of the century?

J.L. - When I knew Martenot in 1948, I told him right away, "You must build instruments," and I helped him as much as I could to do that. I gave him money to finance a new instrument. Then, the instrument had to be wired [transistoriser]. That's what he did, and that's the actual instrument that dates from 1974. One can always emphasize technique, but preserving sensibility is essential.

J.G. - Certain instruments attract certain personalities. Is there a particular personality trait common to those who play this instrument?

J.L. - The keys are small and I am sure that caused trouble for boys. So without a doubt it attracted more women. But I don't think that it's an especially feminine instrument.

J.G. - To make music, I use many different keyboards, synthesizers.. Most of those instruments don't allow musicians to maintain control. With the Ondes Martinot, one controls the sound, the timbre...

J.L. - It's a human control. I find that in music, it's better that it's the human being [who controls it.] It's a matter of taste, but synthesizers, I'm not too familiar with them. Synthesizers, for sound - they're extraordinary, this is also true for timbre - but for human sensibility, no.

J.G. - You have a very generous view of those instruments.

J.L. - But it's necessary that I have a generous view of humans. If human beings destroy themselves with everything that's atomic, that will be the end. While one's on the earth, in human form, one has to have a grand vision. Sadness, it's to not know where one is, where one is going. In heaven, I don't know, but in any case, all that is here on the earth, it's us, human beings, and one has to.. take to that [lit. arrange oneself accordingly]. Otherwise, you have to suppress life.

J.G. - Even the instrument's conception is perfect because it integrates synthesized/synthetic sounds as well as human sensibility. Through people I meet, I try to make the instrument better known. I know that you go to many conferences and travel a lot in order to talk about this instrument.

J.L. - When they allow me to speak, because often, it's the critic who comes first, they say it's over, that it's finished.

J.G. - Critics are often tough on those who are starting out: with Messiaen, with Radiohead also at the beginning, but finally the important thing is...

J.L. - It's to last. If one loves life. Love must be respected like music: because it's the most precious thing one can receive down here.
--

Incidentally, I put "fantastic" for "fantastique," which you can, but it's "fantastic" in the sense of something bringing to mind a *fantasy* rather than something that's just plan great, as in "That's fantastic!"

[domaines] = fields
[varietes] = variety shows, so yes to the piaf guess i'd think

thanks. what I wouldn't give for a good online french-english dictionary. I know there are some but they're not comprehensive enough to be very useful.. Google is wonderful though, even if the word translate function comes up empty, you can pull up hundreds of pages with the proper context in seconds. Yay google.

Daria, thank you so much! Someone finally sent me a version of that page without the text cut off though, if that's of any help to anything you were unsure of.

bump

(bless you)

another bump

There are still a few parts that are a bit sketchy.

Melissa, I can translate the rest of this for you tomorrow (Tuesday) evening.

This is what I fixed it up into:

Generally, the first thing that people tell you about the Ondes Martenot, is that it's an old instrument that uses electricity: these are its least important characteristics, because they reduce the invention to a simple link in the evolution of electronic instruments, from their prehistory all the way up to... To what, exactly? To Casio keyboards? To samplers?
No, for since the beginning, Mr. Martenot was right. Electronic instruments, since their invention, evolved in this way: from more and more sounds controlled in a more and more precise manner. Today even samplers are no more than a sort of super-organ. While with the Ondes-Martenot, you can control each particular aspect of sound - its color, its tonality, its intensity - and thus sing, climb in pitch or resonance, with as much versatility and precision as a violin.
By comparison, even the Theremin is just a toy. The first time that I heard the Ondes Martenot, I was 15 years old, it was in a recording of the Turangalîla-Symphonie by Messiaen. The sublime sound of the Ondes carried the violins out into the space (listen to this work and you'll see what I mean). Since that day, I've been obsessed with the Ondes. So I was very honored to meet Ms. Loriod, the greatest Ondes Martenot player in the world (it was she who played on the famous recording of the Turangalîla-Symphonie). She's since been, for the last half-century, a central figure in contemporary French music. I had the good fortune to be able to ask her some questions about her life, her work with Messiaen and the future of this remarkable instrument.

Radiohead meeting their idols: Jonny Greenwood visits the venerable Jeanne Loriod, sister-in-law of Olivier Messiaen and still vibrant musician. Together, they talked about the Ondes Martenot, a forgotten instrument that she has played and defended for quite a long time. As a young fan, Jonny had come to ask for advice, before expressing his admiration and his love for the musician and the instrument.
---
Radiohead and Messiaen: A priori, an improbable, almost surrealistic association. Nevertheless, the group has made us used to such incongruous encounters, that stretch and destroy cliches and genre boundaries. Jonny Greenwood wanted to meet Jeanne Loriod, half-sister of Messiaen and passionate musician, expert player of the Ondes-Martenot, that futuristic instrument worthy of Marsupilami, invented in France at the beginning of the 20th century and precursor of the synthesizer. The Ondes Martenot had been frequently used by Olivier Messiaen, notably in his Turangalîla-Symphonie. Its sound had also been popularized by the science fiction films of the 1950s.
The meeting took place in Paris, at Mme Loriod's: Jonny arrived with a bouquet of flowers in his hand, with a slightly anxious air about him, like a fan finally meeting his idol. He had spent the night preparing his interview, revisiting classic works: his features were lightly drawn and he had with him the learning method for the Ondes Martenot written by Mme. Loriod. The meeting went like a musician's dream: in spite of the difference in generations and languages, the two communicated through a shared sense of the marvellous and fantastic, the same dreams nourished by Messiaen. Through his admiration for Jeanne Loriod and her preferred instrument, Jonny also spoke of his amazement before the composer's work. After the interview, he confided, happily: "Two years ago, she played in London and I went to see her at backstage, before the show. She was afraid and left. I suppose that I've already done that as well to certain Radiohead fans..."

J.G. - What was your first contact with the Ondes Martenot?

J.L. - Maurice Martenot invented the instrument and presented it in Paris on May 3 1928. I hadn't been born yet. But I heard it for the first time in 1937: it made an extraordinary sound! I was just a little girl and I asked my parents to explain to me what that sound was that came from the Eiffel Tower... At that time, there was an orchestra of 8 or 9 Ondes Martenots that played at the Eiffel Tower, and I think it was Maurice Martenot's sister, Ginette Martenot, who directed the ensemble.

J.G. - Adolphe Sax also gave his name to an instrument that he invented. Nevertheless, that instrument, used by composers like Berlioz or Saint-Saens, had been used for other kinds of music than that for which it was invented: it was jazz rather than classical music that made the saxophone popular.

J.L. - The Africans had understood right away that they could blow into it and make extraordinary sounds with it. Maurice Martenot, himself, still quite young, was fascinated and stunned by electricity, by sparks or flashes, everything electric. He was so fascinated that he could've said to his parents, "Me, I want to listen to music that comes from silence." Is that what he had created? His instrument, in any case, is silent, his music comes from silence, because it's permitted by electricity...

J.G. - What about the Ondes Martenot attracted Messiaen ?

J.L. - The extraordinary musicality that one can get from it, and above all, the unreal sound that floated over the entire orchestra. It was an original/unique sound that no one had ever heard before. He, who was Catholic, he really thought that when in heaven he'd hear that sound.

J.G. - The first time that I heard Messiaen's music, I was 16, it was at school and I had a very intense experience when listening to his Turangalîla-Symphonie: I saw colors and vibrant images. And flying about the other instruments, I heard the Ondes Martenot which floated above the chords: their sound fascinated me right away. I've really been obsessed by this instrument for a long time and I finally found one last year in France. It's a modern version, made by the grandson of M. Martenot. You yourself, how did you meet Messiaen?

J.L. - I knew Messiaen when he returned from captivity in 1940 because my sister Yvonne was in his harmonics class at the Conservatory. And my sister, back then, was much encouraged by our famous aunt Nelly, she taught my sister music. And she notably asked my sister to play the Preludes of Messiaen who, returning from Germany, came to hear my sister play. In 1945, I went to the premiere of the 'Trois Petites Liturgies de la presence divine' which was played at the old Conservatory.

J.G. - When I was a teenager, I had this obsessive thought: I wanted to follow the Turangalîla-Symphonie everywhere it was played, like one follows someone one loves. I went to see you play it in London, two years ago, with Andrew Davis.

J.L. - I play it everywhere. The music was very well received. I also played it in Russia, I didn't like communism but the Russian people are marvellous. Every four years, they organized a festival of French music, and I went to it each time, in 1974 and in 1989, to play Messiaen or Varese.

J.L. - I travelled a lot with Messiaen and my sister Yvonne, who were married in 1965. It was in Australia that Messiaen recorded those famous birds. It was the moment at which he wrote his opera, Saint Francis of Assisi. He got up at 3am to listen to the lyre bird, a rare bird that one doesn't find in Europe but which he recorded for his compositions.

J.G. - For me, the Ondes Martenot has a sound that's very joyful and mysterious at the same time, like Messiaen's music. What I like is that the sound is very close to the human voice, it's the instrument that most closely approximates it, more than the flute or the oboe. When the instrument came out, many contemporary music composers or electronic music composers pushed it aside because they might have found it too lyrical, too musical, and so they didn't take to it.

J.L. - I think that this instrument was like a revolution. And as always, the French don't know how to recognize innovators/creators. Charpentier composed for the Ondes. Jolivet also, in 1931 he composed a magnificent piece, "Danse incantatoire." Varese wrote "Equatoriales": he composed it for Theremin and he retranscribed it for the Ondes Martenot. Pierre Henry and Pierre Schaeffer weren't willing. Schaeffer, he was an extraordinary man, but he wanted to do something else, he wanted to use noise, the most noise possible. He was less of a musician. Pierre Henry, just the same.

J.G. - You've played in many genres and many places.

J.L. - After the war, I learned the craft right away, in playing a variety of music for Edith Piaf and Tino Rossi, with some very good singers. I also played jazz and a lot of film music, but I don't remember that very well. With Joseph Kosma, or Maurice Jarre and Pierre Boulez, who were Jean Louis Barrault's musicians. Barrault, he was wonderful. And in fact I replaced Pierre Boulez, who also played the Ondes Martenot, he was in fact the one who made it well-known. I replaced him at the Marigny theater. As a musician, I also worked a lot for Unesco. They projected the films of images shot all over the world and I played improvisations: I composed the soundtrack. The Ondes Martenot is an instrument typically used for improvisation, like the organ.

J.G. - How did you see composition for the Ondes Martenot develop?

J.L. - It depended, in fact, on the evolution of the instrument. At the beginning it was a little box, to which Martenot attached the drawing of a keyboard for finding his place: he made a worldwide tour with his little box... He had Ravel listen to his music, who said to him, "It's a marvellous sound. It's fantastical, but the keyboard must be able to vibrate." And that's how Martenot, in 1937, invented the keyboard for the instrument.

J.G. - Reading your method, I came to recognize your enthusiasm for the instrument, enthusiasm shared by your students. What should be done today with this instrument, that I think is the most important one of the century?

J.L. - When I knew Martenot in 1948, I told him right away, "You must build instruments," and I helped him as much as I could to do that. I gave him money to finance a new instrument. Then, the instrument had to be wired. That's what he did, and that's the actual instrument that dates from 1974. One can always emphasize technique, but preserving sensibility is essential.

J.G. - Certain instruments attract certain personalities. Is there a particular personality trait common to those who play this instrument?

J.L. - The keys are small and I am sure that caused trouble for boys. So without a doubt it attracted more women. But I don't think that it's an especially feminine instrument.

J.G. - To make music, I use many different keyboards, synthesizers.. Most of those instruments don't allow musicians to maintain control. With the Ondes Martenot, one controls the sound, the timbre...

J.L. - It's a human control. I find that in music, it's better that it's the human being who controls it. It's a matter of taste, but synthesizers, I'm not too familiar with them. Synthesizers, for sound - they're extraordinary, this is also true for timbre - but for human sensibility, no.

J.G. - You have a very generous view of those instruments.

J.L. - But it's necessary that I have a generous view of humans. If human beings destroy themselves with everything that's atomic, that will be the end. While one's on the earth, in human form, one has to have a grand vision. Sadness, it's to not know where one is, where one is going. In heaven, I don't know, but in any case, all that is here on the earth, it's us, human beings, and one has to arrange oneself accordingly. Otherwise, you have to suppress life.

J.G. - Even the instrument's conception is perfect because it integrates synthesized/synthetic sounds as well as human sensibility. Through people I meet, I try to make the instrument better known. I know that you go to many conferences and travel a lot in order to talk about this instrument.

J.L. - When they allow me to speak, because often, it's the critic who comes first, they say it's over, that it's finished.

J.G. - Critics are often tough on those who are starting out: with Messiaen, with Radiohead also at the beginning, but finally the important thing is...

J.L. - It's to last. If one loves life. Love must be respected like music: because it's the most precious thing one can receive on Earth.