Messiaen analyzes Messiaen: author’s comments on the piano cycle «Twenty Contemplations on the Infant Jesus»

O.M., Belova N V Yakymchuk

doi:10.34064/khnum2-14.03

Abstract

Messiaen analyzes Messiaen: author’s comments on the piano cycle «Twenty Contemplations on the Infant Jesus»

Highlights

Most of Messiaen’s works has an author’s comment
The composer presented an epigraph and a brief explanation to each of the twenty plays. He understood that this was not enough, so he added to the first short comments the more detailed explanations on composition methods, the construction of musical forms, specificity of imaginative content, the designation of leitmotivs and their transformation
We can conclude that a person who meets with the music of Messiaen – and it does not a matter, he listens to it, performs it or analyzes it with notes – becomes involved in the orbit of the Messiaen’s Universe, where the music embodies the Word in a Divine sense, and where the Word filled with life and meaning of the Music. ■ Key words: Messiaen, «Twenty Contemplations on the Infant Jesus», author’s comments, notes, musical form, piano cycle, color

Summary

Introduction

Most of Messiaen’s works has an author’s comment. There are two wide theoretical works devoted to explaining the technique of Messiaen’s compositions and grounds of his system: «Technique of my musical language» (1942) and «Treatise about a rhythm, color and ornithology» (1949–1992, not finished). That the composer tries to present his ideas to the audience. Why is his music not enough, and the composer obviously tries to clothe his ideas in a wordy form yet?. Understanding of the composer’s intentions is important and for performing of his music, and for its adequate perception. A composer’s word in the XX century became usual for us, it is a part of the modern cultural paradigm

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