When MIRAGE was asked to restore the electronic part of Jour, Contre‐jour by Gérard Grisey this composition had virtually disappeared from the scenes. Due to the mixed nature of the composition during our work we were faced with two issues: the first associated with the very bad preservation state of the two magnetic tapes owned by the publisher: chemical‐physical corruption processes had jeopardized readability and quality of the recorded signal. The second issue pertains to the interpretation of the tape/score relationships. e presence of misalignments in respect of the score made all the 4‐track copies available unsuitable for publishing purposes.
Grisey had completed an extraordinary synthesis whose re‐editing required a long and complex path, considering first of all the genesis of this work. The work completed on Jour, Contre‐jour highlighted the importance of the music analysis not only in order to better understand and perform the work, but also as a guide for critical editing; it also restated the role of audio restoration as analytical tool.
