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Christian Vander (musician)
Encyclopedia
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
drummer
Drummer
A drummer is a musician who is capable of playing drums, which includes but is not limited to a drum kit and accessory based hardware which includes an assortment of pedals and standing support mechanisms, marching percussion and/or any musical instrument that is struck within the context of a...
, musician
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
, and founder of the band Magma
Magma (band)
Magma is a French progressive rock band founded in Paris in 1969 by classically trained drummer Christian Vander, who claimed as his inspiration a "vision of humanity's spiritual and ecological future" that profoundly disturbed him. In the course of their first album, the band tells the story of a...
. Besides his work with Magma, he has also performed solo, with the Christian Vander Trio and Christian Vander Quartet, and in Offering.
Vander was born in Nogent-sur-Marne
Nogent-sur-Marne
Nogent-sur-Marne is a commune in the eastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the centre of Paris. Nogent-sur-Marne is a sous-préfecture of the Val-de-Marne département, being the seat of the Arrondissement of Nogent-sur-Marne.-History:...
, Val-de-Marne
Val-de-Marne
Val-de-Marne is a French department, named after the Marne River, located in the Île-de-France region. The department is situated to the southeast of the city of Paris.- Geography :...
.
He is known both for his unique songwriting, virtuosic drumming, and shrill falsetto improvisational/scat singing. His compositions fuse jazz, rock, classical and opera influences, and draw on the work of musicians as diverse as John Coltrane
John Coltrane
John William Coltrane was an American jazz saxophonist and composer. Working in the bebop and hard bop idioms early in his career, Coltrane helped pioneer the use of modes in jazz and later was at the forefront of free jazz...
and Carl Orff
Carl Orff
Carl Orff was a 20th-century German composer, best known for his cantata Carmina Burana . In addition to his career as a composer, Orff developed an influential method of music education for children.-Early life:...
. Vander's music is broadly classified as Progressive rock
Progressive rock
Progressive rock is a subgenre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s as part of a "mostly British attempt to elevate rock music to new levels of artistic credibility." John Covach, in Contemporary Music Review, says that many thought it would not just "succeed the pop of...
, but the style is so unique that it falls under its own category - an idiosyncratic style of music often referred to by fans as Zeuhl
Zeuhl
Zeuhl means celestial in Kobaïan, the constructed language created by Christian Vander. Originally solely applied to the music of Vander's band, Magma, the term zeuhl was eventually used to describe the similar music produced by French bands, beginning in the mid-1970s...
(which means "celestial" in Kobaïan
Kobaïan
-External links:*. Perfect Sound Forever.*....
, a constructed language
Constructed language
A planned or constructed language—known colloquially as a conlang—is a language whose phonology, grammar, and/or vocabulary has been consciously devised by an individual or group, instead of having evolved naturally...
devised by Vander and used exclusively by Magma). There have been several other bands who have incorporated Zeuhl stylings into their compositions, many of which are composed of ex-Magma members. Some of the more notable groups of this variety include Japanese duo Ruins, Magma offshoot Weidorje
Weidorje
Weidorje was a French Zeuhl progressive rock/fusion band, formed in 1976 around former Magma members, bassist Bernhard Paganotti and keyboardist Patrick Gauthier...
and Belgian chamber rock outfit, Univers Zero
Univers Zéro
Univers Zero are an instrumental Belgian band known for playing dark music heavily influenced by 20th century chamber music. The group's name has had three variant spellings, the others being Univers Zéro and Univers-Zero....
.
Christian Vander is the stepson of the famous French jazz piano player Maurice Vander (who was a long time sideman of the French singer Claude Nougaro
Claude Nougaro
Claude Nougaro was a French songwriter and singer.Claude Nougaro was born in Toulouse to a respected French opera singer, Pierre Nougaro, and an Italian piano teacher, Liette Tellini. He was raised by his grandparents in Toulouse where he heard Glenn Miller, Édith Piaf and Louis Armstrong on the...
).
Most of Vander and Magma's recorded work is still available through Vander's own record label, Seventh Records.