Boris VIAN - Autograph letter signed to Roger Vincent. The music.

Boris VIAN (1920.1959)

Autograph letter signed to Roger Vincent.

Two pages in-4° on squared paper. Slnd.

Two file holes in the margins.

Very interesting document from Vian wishing to reorganize musical criticism.

My dear Roger Vincent. I am returning you attached -1) the completed questionnaire -2) a check for F 500 (my contribution 49) -3) a small note that you can read, destroy or bury, ad libitum (but it will pain me )

– Note : Serving records to reviews might no longer be a burden on record publishers if we tried to approach the problem from a different angle. The record review as it is done results in a more or less regular column. This column should practically guide the buyer. In our opinion, it should above all guide the record store. A conscientious bookseller generally bases his work on a) the bibliography of France. b) on criticism. c) on his own readings to order books. A conscientious record store should base itself a) on a monthly discography (to be created). b) on criticism. c) on his own audition impression to order discs. Both can also be based on customer requests, but it is still a complementary activity and results from 1) hearing the records on the radio by the customers in question. 2) the reading that customers may have made of the published reviews.

Outline of an ideal diet . 1st time. The publisher prepares this or that disc. He submits his proofs or main critiques. 2nd time. Before the release of the record the reviews appear (in a bulletin equivalent to the library but more sophisticated) and allow the record store to guide itself. 3rd time. At the same time as the disc is released, it is accompanied in the catalog by press extracts that the association automatically provides to publishers. It is understood that this is a limit regime, ideal for the association – to be adapted according to the objections that can be made: the case of fashionable songs, recorded in any case. It is up to the association to establish honest, objective, scrupulous and qualified criticism. Under no circumstances should the association's control over records become censorship like film censorship. There may be “uncritical” discs, etc. The whole thing would be financed by a tax (1 or 2 F. per disk for example) collected from the pocket of the buyer who does not care about paying 1F more or less for a disk of 250 balls average price. The approval of a record by the association should become a quality label similar to the NF stamp. ATG of the gas technical association and AFNOR. The association would have its monthly discography, sent to all record stores, and it would be famous. We would become great characters instead of being tolerated losers. It is also obvious that all this should be supplemented by action with French radio broadcasting with a view to obtaining regular broadcasts from the association where its members take turns, broadcast divided into sections: great classical music, modern music, light music , dance and cabaret, song, jazz, etc. Note that there are already broadcasts of this order and that there is no question of eliminating them (those of Panigel or Delaunay for example) but of extending the benefit of their incontestable quality to the association.

There you go - all this needs to be ordered and developed. Forgive me for bothering you for so long, but I dream of a big monthly booklet “Discography of the French Phonographic Press Association” with a print run of five thousand copies (or more, let's go for it) and porphyry desks and marble where, on all floors one could read the grateful certificates of Pathé Marconi, Decca, and the rest while listening to the SAPP pressings (selected by the Phonographic Press Association). »