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These pages contain program notes written for Redwood
Symphony. You are free to use the information in your own program
notes. If you quote me directly, please attribute it. Thanks!
These notes were edited, amended, and otherwise
improved by Eric Kujawsky, Peter Stahl, and Doug Wyatt.
Barbara Heninger
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Olivier Messiaen
Un Sourire
Olivier Messiaen's music was equally influenced by his deep spirituality and
his interest in a wide range of musical sources -- from plain chant to Indian
ragas, serial techniques to birdsong. He entered the Paris Conservatoire at the
age of 11, studying organ and improvisation with Marcel Dupré and composition
with Paul Dukas. He was principal organist at La Trinité Cathedral in Paris for
nearly 40 years beginning in 1930, and he returned to the Conservatoire as a
teacher starting in 1942; his students included Pierre Boulez and Karlheinz
Stockhausen.
One of his most famous pieces, Quatuor pour la fin du temps (Quartet
for the End of Time), a chamber work for piano, clarinet, violin, and cello, was
written for himself and three musicians while they were prisoners of war in
Germany in 1940; they premiered the piece in prison for their fellow captives.
Appropriately for the circumstances, the piece is a musical treatment of the end
of the world as prophesied in the Book of Revelations. Other works include the Turangalila-symphonie
(1944), which makes use of Hindu rhythms and the Ondes Martenot, an early
electronic instrument; Catalog d'oiseaux (Catalog of the Birds, 1958), a
piano work based on birdsongs transcribed by the composer; and St. Francis
d'Assise (1983), his only opera, a four-hour work representing his myriad
musical influences as well as his strongly mystical Catholic faith.
Un Sourire (A Smile) was Messiaen's last commissioned work and his
contribution to the celebrations of Mozart's bicentenary in 1991. Explaining how
the work honored Mozart, Messiaen wrote: "despite bereavements, sufferings,
hunger, cold, incomprehension and the proximity of death, Mozart still smiled,
his music also. That is why I allowed myself, in all humility, to call my act of
homage 'A smile.'" The short piece contrasts two very different themes,
with the first section built on a slow, melodic phrase introduced by strings and
oboe. The calm yet eerily unearthly chords demonstrate the composer's deft
technique with rich tonalities. This quiet "A" section is followed by
the brusque "B" section, an angular, energetic passage by winds and
percussion. The brittle rhythms are quite complex, consisting of irregular
groupings of two or three 32nd notes. After a brief interlude, the "A"
section returns and the two themes continue to alternate, each time in slightly
longer and slightly slower form, until we are left with a final extended,
ethereal chord -- perhaps the "smile" of the title.
June, 2004
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