[silence] Henri Pousseur obituary

[John Whiting]

By now most of you will know of the death of Henri Pousseur on March 6th but, 
unless you are a reader of the continental European press, it will be way of 
blog or grapevine. None of the British or American newspapers even mentioned it. 
When I emailed the Guardian obit editor three weeks later he asked me if I’d 
write one. On June 11th it finally appeared: 
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/jun/11/obituary-henri-pousseur

A quarter century ago, after I had put together the tape for Henri's “Tales and 
Songs from the Bible of Hell”, I wrote:

“I felt throughout this entire procedure that I knew exactly what Henri wanted. 
Only once did I telephone him for confirmation. He had sent me a tape of 
electronic music for incorporation and because of the sounds it contained I was 
uncertain whether it was heads-out or tails-out. He told me that it was 
heads-out — end of conversation.

”Before the performance, there had been no time to send Henri the tape in 
advance. When he had heard it through during the afternoon rehearsal, he nodded 
and said, ‘Yes, that’s what I had in mind.’”

When I began to write this obit, I had the same feeling, and so, in a very real 
sense, it was written from dictation.

John Whiting
www.whitings-writings.com