Messiaen: Turangalila Symphony / L'Ascension

Featuring

Antoni Wit
Thomas Bloch
François Weigel
Narodowa Orkiestra Symfoniczna Polskiego Radia NOSPR
Olivier Messiaen

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Composer Biography

Olivier Messiaen's mother, Cécile Sauvage, was a poet who wrote a touching account of motherhood while awaiting his birth.

Instruments

Thomas Bloch, the performer on this album, specializes in rare instruments such as the ondes Martenot, glassharmonica, and cristal Baschet, and has given over 1300 performances.

Composition History

Messiaen composed his Quatuor pour la fin du Temps (Quartet for the End of Time) while a prisoner of war in Stalag VIIIA in Silesia, where it was first performed for five thousand prisoners.

Composition History

The monumental Turangalîla-Symphonie was commissioned by Sergey Koussevitzky, a Russian conductor, with the unusual instruction to write 'the work you want to, in the style you want, as long as you want, with the instrumental formation you want'.

Composer's Artistic Vision

The title 'Turangalîla' comes from Sanskrit and means 'song of love, hymn to joy, time, movement, rhythm, life and death', with 'Lîla' referring to divine workings in the cosmos and 'Turanga' to time.

Compositional Technique

The Turangalîla-Symphonie is unified by four recurring generative themes: the 'statue theme', 'flower theme', 'love theme', and 'chord theme', which appear throughout the ten movements.

Composer Biography

Messiaen spent almost half a century at the Paris Conservatoire, first as a student from age eleven, then as a teaching staff member from 1941 until retirement.