Part 1B – Paper 4 – Dissertation
How important was orchestral composition (until 1933) in the early compositional career of Olivier Messiaen, and what role did religion and poetry play in the construction of those works?
2008 Candidate Number: 2474K
Word Count: 6,985
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Contents Contents
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Introduction
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Critical Overview
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‘Offrandes oubliées’ - The importance of Messiaen’s early orchestral compositions.
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‘Qu’ai-je fait, mon enfant?’ - The effect of poetry and home life on Messiaen’s early orchestral style.
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A brief afterthought of time
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Conclusions
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Bibliography
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Introduction In this centenary year of the birth of Olivier Messiaen, research is beginning to undermine the belief that during his early career, Messiaen was simply an organistcomposer. In a recent article, Christopher Dingle (2007) has noted that Messiaen published six works before his appointment at La Trinité, of which only two were for organ. Furthermore, during his first five years as organist of La Trinité he composed only one completely original work for the instrument. Before Dingle’s recent research, little attention had been paid to the early orchestral compositions of Messiaen, from 1928 to 1933. The musical world had also shied away from the unfashionable question of the importance of his faith in reference to his composition, in particular to his early orchestral works. However, Père JeanRodolphe Kars (2007) has started to examine this aspect in depth, even if, as expected, he presents a one-sided argument in favour of the Catholic Church. Andrew Shenton (2008) has recently augmented this view from, perhaps, a less biased position. Still less has been said on the importance of poetry in relation to Messiaen’s orchestral compositions, apart from a recent afterword on a new translation of L’Âme en Bourgeon by Philip Weller (2007). In this dissertation, I will review the early orchestral works (1928–1933) of Messiaen, and discuss their importance for both the start of the composer’s professional career, and also the relationship to their religious and poetic content. I shall specifically look at Messiaen’s first published orchestral work Les Offrandes oubliées (1930). In addition, I shall examine L’Âme en Bourgeon (1910), the set of poems composed by Cécile Sauvage when she was pregnant with her son and any influence they had, in addition to poetry in a broader sense, on Messiaen’s ‘early’ orchestral compositions. From 1928 to 1933 could be seen as Messiaen’s ‘early period’ of orchestral composition, as it encapsulates the Fugue (unpublished, 1928) and his first large-scale orchestral work L’Ascension (completed 1933, first performed 1935). There follows a ten year break in orchestral composition before Messiaen composed the TurangalîlaSymphonie (1946). The orchestral works that span this four-year period are obviously important as they shed light on the development of Messiaen’s orchestral composition in the preparation for his Turangalîla-Symphonie, the centrepiece of his epic Tristan inspired trilogy, and his most ambitious work for orchestra.
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CHAPTER ONE
Critical Overview Messiaen as a ‘born believer’ (Samuel 1994) was a devout Catholic, ‘I am at the moment […] almost like a priest’ (Messiaen quoted in Caecilia 1993). The orchestra acts as the most powerful sound medium and speaks to the unconverted. It allows the non-believer to be introduced to, and also experience, the light of God. Coming from a literary family, Messiaen also allowed poetry to play a central role in the compositional process. Although the influences of poetry and religion may have been at some level accepted by musicologists, few have examined their relation to his earliest orchestral works. Recently Christopher Dingle in ‘Forgotten offerings: Messiaen’s first orchestral works’ (2007), Père Jean-Rodolphe Kars in ‘The works of Olivier Messiaen and the Catholic liturgy’ (2007), Philip Weller in the afterword of his recent translation of L’Âme en bourgeon (2007) and Andrew Shenton in the ‘Introduction’ and ‘Messiaen’s Theology’ of Olivier Messiaen's System of Signs: Notes Towards Understanding His Music (2008), have focused their attention on various aspects of these concepts. *** Dingle (2007) has looked at the misconception (as he calls it) of Messiaen as an ‘organist-composer’ and the importance of the orchestra in the first years of Messiaen’s compositional career. Dingle rightly stresses the neglect of Messiaen’s early orchestral compositions, showing that even the most knowledgeable of Messiaen scholars including Aprahamian (1954), Hayes (1995) and Griffiths (2004) have overlooked these works. However, the main reason for the article is to reassign the correct preface to the Hymne au Saint-Sacrement (1932). Apart from some general analysis of Messiaen’s first four published works for orchestra, Dingle does little other than recount already known historical fact. The article is also partly justified due to the complete lack of focused material on this area. However, Dingle fails to discuss the possibility that Messiaen’s lack of organ compositions in his early years may be due to the relative novelty of the instrument for the composer. It is an idea that is strangely avoided, as Dingle mentions the historically significant fact that Messiaen only started to learn the organ at the age of eighteen. In the basic analysis that does exist, Dingle’s arguments are heavily based upon personal interpretation. Nonetheless, the querulous first and third sections of Le Tombeau [resplendissant] are markedly different in approach not just from the ‘Sin’ episode of Les Offrandes oubliées, but from anything else in Messiaen’s oeuvre. This music has a rage that might be thought anathema to the composer (Dingle 2007).
Without any musical support, this argument could be deconstructed and one could propose that the two evident ‘Sin’ episodes of Le Tombeau resplendissant (1931) are a development of the middle section of Les Offrandes oubliées. The idea of development could be taken further with reference to the isolated chord Dingle refers to on page 8 of his article. Although he rightly assigns the motif’s derivation from Messiaen’s teacher Dúkas, the way in which the argument is presented assumes that this device has not been used before in Messiaen’s music. This would seem to overlook the start of the second section of Les Offrandes oubliées, where the chord
and bass drum are heard together, not to segregate, but to start the second episode. Thus, one could say that the chord in Le Tombeau is a development of one found in Les Offrandes oubliées. *** Père Kars (2007) opens his chapter (p.323) by describing Messiaen’s works as holding ‘an extraordinary message of faith, hope and love’. Kars manages to present several important factors of Messiaen’s faith and their relation to his compositional process. However he does not explain or show support for his opening statement. Kars rightly demonstrates the importance of dazzlement in Messiaen’s music by quoting St François from the opera, ‘Free me, inebriate me, dazzle me […] with the excess of truth’ (p.323). One does wish that he would go further by allowing the music to support his argument. To proclaim that Messiaen’s work ‘shed some light on the sacred mysteries’ (p.324) and that his works contain a ‘mystical and prophetic’ (p.323) dimension is of course a subjective and personal perspective. It is a bold statement to proclaim without musical support. For music to be representative of an ideal or general goal, for example the light of God, is possible. However, for it to explain some part of the complex mysteries of the faith is something completely different. It may be comprehensible for someone who has devoted themselves to God and Messiaen. For the common musicologist, even with a sound understanding of both, the principle may be a little far fetched. Messiaen is a Catholic who focuses on the glory in the liturgy, but there is a difference between composing works that allow understanding of the liturgy, and those based on belief and the liturgies displaying God’s power. *** Furthering Kars’ exploration into the theology of Messiaen and the Catholic Faith, Shenton (2008) looks towards finding an answer to the power of Messiaen’s music in both his introduction and first chapter. His introduction to basic Catholic theology allows the reader to develop a sense of security. Shenton is not just writing for the convert, as might be accused of Kars. He rightly portrays Messiaen’s music as ‘Theologia Gloriae’ (p.28), although he does all but neglect the inclusion of worldly and personal sin in Les Offrandes oubliées and Le Tombeau. Shenton looks at the purpose of Messiaen’s music in a more justified and general sense than Kars. Shenton says that: ‘as a layman [it] allowed him [Messiaen] to bring the liturgy into the concert hall and present it to everyone, thereby engaging in a fundamental kind of evangelism’ (p.23). Shenton argues that it is a general, yet powerful, portrayal of God that Messiaen tries to portray. However, he argues that the idea of Messiaen as ‘theosophical’ rather than ‘theological’, as put forward by Mellers in ‘Mysticism and Theology’ (1995), is ‘perplexing’ (p.24). The idea that Messiaen is ‘theosophical’ surely portrays Messiaen as trying to move people through his music to spiritual ecstasy, rather than defining the more theologically specific liturgy of the Catholic Church. Shenton’s exploration is one that allows a non-theologian a means by which to understand some of the more complex doctrine of the Catholic Faith. Sadly, however, it does not focus on the music of Messiaen, rather on his conversations
about his faith. When the focus is on music, he refers to the Méditations sur le mystère de la Sainte Trinité. Although this is clearly relevant to his main discussion on Messiaen’s ‘System of Signs’, it does neglect the obvious opportunity of a discussion of Messiaen’s orchestral music. Thus said, he allows one important quote by Messiaen to be re-illuminated, ‘My work is addressed to all who believe and also to all others’ (Rößler 1984) (p.24). Here one can see that Messiaen was writing not only for the converted, but also for those yet to experience the glory of God. Shenton’s claim of Messiaen being an evangelist is therefore, to a degree, supported. The introduction to the light of God in the setting of a concert rather than a Church service allows a sense of security for the non-believing listener. Thus, the sense of power and spirituality portrayed through the unconventional use of key, texture, dynamic and temporal stasis controlled by a pre-determined poetic setting, allows the listener to be spiritually moved, without feeling the constraints and pressures of the ecclesiastical setting.
CHAPTER TWO
‘Offrandes oubliées’ The importance of Messiaen’s early orchestral compositions. Messiaen was appointed titular organist at La Trinité in Paris at the age of 22. Before his appointment at La Trinité, only two of his six published works were for Organ; Le Banquet Celeste (1928) and Diptyque (1930). Even Le Banquet céleste was an adaptation of Le Banquet eucharistique (1928), an unpublished work for orchestra. It is clear from Messiaen’s contemporary comments that the organ was not part of an initial idea of what his life would hold, ‘It’s not what I wanted at the start, but I have grown progressively accustomed to it’ (Meltzheim & Eid, 1991). At a time when he was not governed by composing for commission, Messiaen was free to utilise the instrumentation or subject of composition as he so wished. It might have been expected that his first major work would be for his primary instrument, the organ. In fact it was Le Banquet eucharistique, composed and performed during his time at the Paris Conservatoire. During his first five years as organist of La Trinité he composed only one original work for organ, his short Apparition de l'église éternelle, as well as transcribing L’Ascension for the organ in 1934, something he would come to regret in later life. From the above it is fair to state that Messiaen’s principal focus at the start of his compositional career was the orchestra. Having been given a fortunate opportunity of an early performance of one of his orchestral works, he capitalised on composing for the orchestra, the medium which he felt served the purpose of his ‘evangelism’. However, the organ was an important factor in the development of Messiaen as a musician. As a practising organist in Paris during the 1930s, the city had experienced Vierne, Widor, Tournemire, Franck, Faure and Messiaen’s own teacher Dupré. Paris was the centre for the French school of organ improvisation, a style that was unlike the English in that it was highly formalised. His evident ability for improvisation on the piano, prompted his inclusion in the organ class of Dupré at the Conservatoire. The training was dominated by a study of modality. Alan Forte in his chapter ‘Messiaen’s Chords’ (2007, p.23) argues that from the musical evidence, which includes Messiaen’s examples in Technique de mon language musical (Messiaen, 1944) and in Traité, it is clear that Messiaen regarded each mode as a large source harmony rather than simply as a scale that consists of contiguous pitches, in the venerable tradition of medieval modes.
The use of modal language is evident in his early career as can be seen in the opening of Les Offrandes oubliées. A plainchant melody (to become one of Messiaen’s major influences in his career) is heard in unison from the strings, at first, but then from bar five the plainchant melody is used in connection with the modal language and a richness of Debussyian colour. However, a ‘metallic’ shading of the chords originating from the modal French improvisatory style is introduced, that could be seen to highlight the presence of God. Thus, one could see Messiaen’s lifetime dedication to the organ as not only a way of repaying his God for the gift that he believed He had given him, but also as a way of experimenting and augmenting his range of harmonic colourations and tonalities, to allow the exultation of his God as effectively as possible.
During his lifetime, he only composed three works for use during the actual mass: O Sacrum Convivium (1937), Messe de la Pentecote (1950), and a Mass (unpublished 1933) for 8 sopranos and 4 violins. For a man who was so devout, this may seem strange. A reply in 1964 to Abbé Pezeril may help one to understand the lack of composition in an area that was seemingly so personally important: ‘Unfortunately, I believe my music to be much too complex to be of use to you: it can only be played on the piano, on the organ and above all by an orchestra’ (Hill, 2007). As well as providing an explanation for composing so little liturgical music throughout his life, this reply also stresses the importance of the orchestra to Messiaen. It is possible that his initial success with Le Banquet eucharistique encouraged the composition of his early orchestral works. However, the wish to commentate on a subject of great importance to him is evident as his first four published symphonic works dealt with the subject of religion. This medium of composition was not only, he felt, the most adept vehicle for the complexity of sounds he was attempting to create, but also allowed him to promote his beliefs to the widest possible audience. (Samuel 1994). In accordance with the Catechism of the sixteenth-century Council of Trent music should only serve to enhance the spiritual state and raise the liturgy to a higher level during the mass. However, in the concert hall, music can be used to recreate the spiritual state and serves the purpose of, or even replaces the liturgy, without enforcing belief on the listener thus acting in a more subtle and less intrusive manner to promote the faith. Drawing on subject matter from the latter part of Messiaen’s career, in words borrowed from St Thomas Aquinas, we understand the importance of religion to Messiaen and the influence of both music and poetry on his beliefs: Lord, Lord, Music and Poetry have drawn me to you: through image, through symbols and in the search for truth…Free me, inebriate me, dazzle me forever with the excess of truth. (Act 3, Tableau 8 of St Francois d’Assise)
Messiaen said, ‘The first idea I wanted to express, the most important, is the existence of the truths of the Catholic faith’ as well as ‘I was born a believer, I would perhaps never have composed anything had I not received this grace’ (Samuel, 1994). It is clear that religion was one of the defining factors in the life and compositions of Messiaen. His confessor gave him Dom Columba Marmion’s Le Christ dans ses mystères, on which he commented that, ‘I have discovered a magnificent book…each mystery has its own individual beauty…splendour…grace’ (Hill 2007). Although this statement adds little to a factual understanding of Messiaen as a composer it enhances our perception of what Messiaen may have been trying to achieve in his religiously based compositions, especially those of his early period. However, the comment does allow one to understand how he felt towards the mysteries of his faith. The idea that each ‘mystery has its own individual beauty…splendour…grace’ displays three important factors in his early compositions, demonstrated in the opening of Les Offrandes oubliées. Here the beauty lies in the simplicity of the accompaniment, the splendour of the broad timeless quality, as if radiating majesty, and the grace is created by the tessitura used and the particularly slow tempo set by the composer, creating an aura of elegance and mysticism.
Père Kars (2007) presents the idea of ‘this ability to make things “visible” through sound’. Although difficult to prove, due to the dependence on the feelings and aural perceptions beholden to each and every listener, Messiaen, unlike others who used their music to support religious acts (for example Berlioz’s Grande Messe des Morts or Widor’s O salutaris), used the music to be those acts, rather than as a vehicle for those acts. Once again this is supported by Père Kars’ notion that the music ‘is not simply ornamentum but also sacramentum’ to the faith. Messiaen quoted Thomas Aquinas by saying; ‘God dazzles us by the excess of truth’ (Kars, 2007). Messiaen was affected by synesthesia and this facilitated the use of colour in his harmonies. His post impressionistic style could be seen to be used to bedazzle the listener. White light is a blend of all the colours in the visual spectrum. Thus, by trying to create as many colours in his harmonic language, Messiaen can recreate a sense of light in his music and so artificially create God’s power to the non-believer. Messiaen in his Traité VII proposes a similar idea: I think that one must listen to my music, forgetting its success (not to mention the polemics that attended that success!), and even forgetting the music. What does a rose-window in a cathedral do? It teaches through imagery, through symbolism, through all the characteristics that inhabit it – but what most catches the eye are its very thousand spots of colour which ultimately dissolve into a single very pure shade, so that someone looking on says only, ‘That window is blue’, or ‘That window is violet.’ I had nothing more than this in mind…
The three earliest orchestral works show the development of Messiaen’s portrayal of his beloved religion. The first, Les Offrandes oubliées, acts as a commentary on three important facts of religion held important by Messiaen; Christ’s sacrifice, human sin, and the Eucharist. It is a passive commentary. It is a dedication to the life of Jesus and his love for humankind, summarised by the closing statement of the first and last verse: Vous nous aimez, doux Jésus, nous l’avions oublié (you love us, sweet Jesus: that we had forgotten). After the premiere at the Concerts Straram on 19th February 1931, the critic André George in Les Nouvelles littéraires said: His work is testimony to an artistic temperament in which the spirit of his mother’s poetry is rediscovered, […] I find again the magnificent gifts […] [he] has no fear of the human, nor of that which goes beyond the human. […] The rhythmic variety […] the beautiful handling of the orchestra are enough to place this composer among those who make their mark from the outset.
This praise was added to by Guy Chastel in Les Amitiés (March 1931): A phrase which dares to sustain itself for more than three notes, and music which is emotional and knows how to move people: in our day and age that is a rare and novel pleasure […] Olivier Messiaen’s symphonic meditation brings us closer to them [the Cross and the Host].
In the second composition, Le Tombeau resplendissant, Messiaen makes an exceptionally vicious attack on himself. Unlike Messiaen’s quiet all loving-soul, we see a rare, if not unique glimpse of a Messiaen that can be associated with a furious depiction of own sin. Messiaen, during the poem, writes: Ma jeunesse est morte: c’est moi qui l’ai tuée. (My youth is dead: it is I who have killed it.). In an interview for L’Intransigeant (18 October 1931) Messiaen said: ‘in Le Tombeau resplendissant, I wanted to write a kind of Beatitude for those who discover in their faith something more than the illusions of a distant youth.’ However, as the work remained unpublished until 1997, five years after his death, Messiaen must have had deeper reasons for keeping such a work out of his published catalogue (although recognised in his Technique, 1994). He may have withheld its publication due to the dramatically
personal nature of its content. It was certainly not withheld due to a poor reception. After the first performance in 1933 by Pierre Monteux and the Orchestre Symphonique de Paris, Klingsor wrote in Le monde musical (28th February): ‘[…] for this work is captivating. There is quite audacious modernism’. Hymne au Saint-Sacrement was premiered just months after Le Tombeau. The score was lost during the years of the Second World War, but was recreated from memory by Messiaen in 1947 as ‘Hymne’. Once again the work was critically acclaimed, and the sense of power present in the work was commented on by Paul le Flem in Comoedia (27 March 1933): [it] evokes a mysticism where ecstasy and fervour are combined. […] Religious fervour, serenity and human violence are portrayed through musical means which are bold to the point of fierceness.
The use of plainchant is clearly prominent at the opening of Les Offrandes oubliées, in the unison nature of the string writing, which emphasises the hypnotic nature of the chant and demonstrates its stepwise movement. This mesmeric melody is layered over thirds present in the flutes, clarinets, bassoons and horns. It is evident that the use of thirds is important. Les Offrandes oubliées displays the obvious importance of the Trinity. The poem is in three verses; the work is in three parts. The opening three bars comprise thirty beats. The plainchant-like melody of the first 30 beats is separated by the appearance of the first tritone in the melody between beats 15 and 16. This theme also exists in the tempo relationships. If one takes the fastest section of the piece, its suggested tempo (by Messiaen) is quaver equals 336 beats per minute. The slowest section of the piece is marked at 36 quaver beats per minute. The obvious third relationship that can be obtained from these two tempi, at the extremes of the tempi markings in the piece, may not have been a direct decision by Messiaen. However it certainly exists, again reflecting the tripartite nature of the prefacing poem. The importance of key is obviously a factor as well. Ending in E major, Messiaen is clearly already at this early stage defining the importance of a key which is later to be established at the climax of La Transfiguration. Mahler had already set a precedent for this key. In his fourth symphony at the entry of the saints, E major is enforced as the governing tonality. As well as ending Les Offrandes oubliées in E major, Messiaen also finishes (as well as begins) with muted strings, possibly representing the ‘light of God’. The total effect of the E major tonality, and the muted strings and speed of the passage create a ‘levitational’ quality to the closing passage. It is possible to take this comparison further with a closer reading of the poem. The three sections refer to the three verses of the poem. The sin depicted in the second verse is clearly represented by the tempo, dynamic and abruptness of the timbre as well as the stark contrast to the preceding passage. In the words of Messiaen: [The first section is] lamentation in groups of uneven duration, cut by long mauve and grey wailings […the second is…] strong final accents, whistling glissando harmonics, incisive calls from trumpets […] and the third has a long, slow phrase from the violins, rising over a carpet of pianissimo chords, with reds, golds and blues, like a distant stained glass window, lit by muted soloists. (Samuel, 1994)
To disregard the importance of the organ at the start of Messiaen’s career would be as heinous as the lack of attention that has been given to the early orchestral works. However, Messiaen established his effective glorification of God during the early years of his life. Only in Les Offrandes oubliées and Le Tombeau, is there a representation of sin. By Hymne, Messiaen has become devoted to the glorification of God and it is by the use of the orchestra that he has found his most successful means, to carry out this ‘evangelism’.
CHAPTER THREE
‘Qu’ai-je fait, mon enfant?’ The effect of poetry and home life on Messiaen’s early orchestral style. Messiaen’s first three major orchestral works, Les Offrandes oubliées, Le tombeau and Hymne au Saint-Sacrement, each display two major influences; poetry and religion. All three works are entitled ‘Meditation Symphonique’. All three are concerning a topic of religion, and all three are preceded by a poem written by Messiaen as if a prologue for the listener, to aid with the meditation which he or she is about to experience. The importance of poetry played a large part in both the education and compositional process of Messiaen. Messiaen himself composed a large amount of poetry, whether initially as prefaces to his orchestral works or later in his song cycles, for example Harawi or Poèmes pour Mi. Messiaen was therefore a poet as well as a composer. His mother, Cecile Sauvage, wrote L’Âme en Bourgeon, and so Messiaen was already involved with poetry before he was born. Messiaen’s father, Pierre, was an avid Shakespearian enthusiast, who was to produce an important translation of Shakespeare’s plays into French. Thus perhaps it is not surprising to think that Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande, given to Messiaen by Jehan de Gibon, made such a large impression on Messiaen at such a young age (eleven). Messiaen reported that his parents discussed the contemporary French poets, such as Henri de Régnier, Francis Jammes, Anna de Noailles, Marie Nöel and Maurice Barrès, ‘they were thought of as important, and passed for being very modern at that time’ (Massin, 1989). The amount of poetry, and poetry which was contemporary and advanced, that Messiaen was exposed to at such a young age, helps to explain the large influence it had throughout his life and more importantly at the early stage of his orchestral compositional career. It would allow him to present advanced concepts through music by poetic means. It is clear that his mother closed herself off from her family at the end of her life. Sauvage’s health had been worsening for some time, and she died of tuberculosis in 1927. She withdrew from social life and her depressed state involved the close family. However, it was Messiaen who recalled his father and brother from a short holiday the day before his mother died. Thus, the poems that preface Messiaen’s three early orchestral works could be seen as a dedication to his mother. His father as a believer and his mother as a poet are two defining characteristics that are unified in the early orchestral works of Messiaen. It is as if he is looking to reunite a couple that had become increasingly distant after the First World War. Sauvage’s personal beliefs and her feelings on the state of her world are clearly stated through her poetry and more specifically in L’Âme en bourgeon. Her beliefs are crucial to understanding those of Messiaen’s. What is as important however is the medium and style in which she portrays those beliefs. In the words of Weller (2007):
Its relation to its subject matter, and the emotion this releases, was at a certain level direct and powerful, yet at the same time also stylized and indirect, encoded within a formal language that was itself embodied within an artistic medium, distinct from life yet also connected to it by profound affinities.
Messiaen would later comment on the subject of maternity, ‘the Mother is something sacred, which one dare not touch directly […]. A man simply cannot feel or express the feelings of motherhood and maternity’ (Weller, 2007). The influence of Messiaen’s mother on his career is undoubtedly clear. In L’Âme en bourgeon, Sauvage demonstrates her passion not only for light, inspired by their house at Digneles- Bains, but also colour and nature. These aspects were evidently crucial to the compositional imagination of Messiaen. He would later say that his mother was prophetic in her writing of L’Âme en bourgeon, ‘the most extraordinary thing was that the whole book is addressed to a boy’ (Messiaen 1987), before, of course, his mother knew the gender of the child she was to bear. Messiaen continued later by saying: Certain of [her] verses are true premonitions: ‘L’angoisse du mystere ou l’art va se briser’ [and] ‘she even understood that for me “music” would be “colour”: ‘Souffle sur cette eau mauve ou la campagne dort…Je souffre d’un lointain musical que j’ignore’ […] perhaps the most extraordinary of her prophecies was that she should have forseen that one day, after her death, I would become an ornithologist…for indeed I was later to transcribe the songs of the turtle dove (tourterelle), the skylark (alouette des champs), the woodlark (alouette lulu) and the song-thrush (grieve musiciene). (Messiaen, 1987)
The contents of L’Âme en bourgeon were of importance to him on literary, imaginative and emotional levels. In the self-published entry of the Dictionaire de musique of 1970 Messiaen commenced the entry with: ‘His mother, the poetess Cécile Sauvage, wrote a book of poetry entitled L’Âme en bourgeon [...] and this ‘lyrical waiting’ was to influence the whole of the musician’s life.’
This is further confirmed by his statement, ‘I am convinced that the “lyrical waiting” of L’Âme en bourgeon has influenced my career and destiny’ (Messiaen, 1987). Thus in its composition L’Âme en bourgeon encapsulated the closeness between mother and son. It is a closeness that was not damaged by Sauvage’s lack of belief, nor before her death by the distance she created between herself, her sons and her husband. Sauvage in L’Âme en bourgeon avoids any sense of embracing religion, instead using a classical based style, with similarities to book VI of The Aeneid (Virgil). There is almost a rejection of religion: Je n’aurais pas voulu, desséchant sur mon pied, Etre l’arbe sterile au tronc atrophié Où l’abeille maçonne aurait creusé sa chambre, Où quelque cep noueux gonflant sa grappe d’ambre Aurait mis sur ma branche un air pâlot d’été Sans que je paricipe à sa divinité.
I’ve never wished, nor yet desired, to be the sterile tree, Dry with age as it stands alone, and where the bee In building hollows out its refuge in the decaying trunk, Where some gnarled vine laying out its golden fruit Would give my branch a blanched pale-summer look, Without my having shared in its divinity.1
Messiaen relates the unification between mother and son to being close to a communion, a theological and Catholic concept and the core of his belief; “The union of the mother with the child is almost a ‘communion’, [and] is also an exchange” (Massin 1989). Although observing the origins of life from two very different perspectives, both Messiaen and Sauvage underline the importance of the soul. However, Messiaen connects his mothers’, and latterly his own, devotion to nature, with his devout belief of Catholicism in his portrayal of ‘landscape as divine grandeur, mountains as divine sublimity, light as divine emanation, colour as divine coruscation, [and] birds as God’s musicians’ (Weller 2007). Throughout L’Âme en bourgeon Sauvage focuses on the idea of the continuous presence of death and the transient, fragmented experience of human life. Thus from the first day of Messiaen’s life he was quietly and subtly accustomed to the idea of the transcendent, and so unintentionally on his mother’s part, when pared with Catholicism the idea of the transfiguration was not such a large concept to understand. The characteristics of L’Âme en bourgeon flow into the early compositional technique of Messiaen. There is a use of imagery in Sauvage’s poetry that prevents ambiguity by a fundamental intensity of belief in the subject and purpose of its creation. With subtle feminine control, Sauvage allows vitality and ‘emotional courage’ (Weller 2007) to permeate her work. This restraint is evident in the two slow passages of Les Offrandes oubliées, which surround the portrayal of forgotten sin contained in the second section. Not only are there similarities in restraint shown, but also one of convincing joyous power, between mother and son. Sauvage portrays this joy as an elemental power, a primitive deep-rooted connection to nature. Although this quality was more evident towards the middle and end of Messiaen’s career, for example in Joie du sang des etoiles, the fifth movement from the TurangalîlaSymphonie, or Des Canyons aux Étoiles, it is evident in the radiance of E major at the end of Les Offrandes oubliées. Sauvage saw life portrayed as light, energy and as colour, but amid all the joy and beauty of life that the world contained, the tragic (or for Messiaen, sin as in the middle section of Les Offrandes oubliées and the first and third section of Le Tombeau) was never far from the surface of a living soul. The idea of sin, both personal and worldly, dominated the early orchestral compositions of Messiaen, personally in Le Tombeau, and worldly in Les Offrandes oubliées. It was in effect this same factor that Messiaen most admired about his mother’s poetry: ‘the truth of [her] observation, the quality of her imagery, the music of her words, an acute sense of the beauties of Nature…[the portrayal] even those things which are most difficult to say.’ (Messiaen, 1987)
From L’Âme en bourgeon, by Cecile Sauvage, II Voilà que je me sens…, 1908, translated by Weller (2007). 1
Messiaen once commented on the strength of his mothers ‘poetic seeing’, ‘a mode of perception which operated with the transfigured memory of the thing, rather than just the thing itself (Weller 2007). This connection is of the most importance, with spiritual portrayal in Messiaen’s music, which is evident from the very outset of his orchestral compositional career. The ‘poetic seeing’ imbued in his music utilises ‘the eyes of childhood’ and sincerity printed in the manifesto of La Jeune France ‘une musique vivante dans un même élan de sincérité, de générosite, de conscience artistique’ (JFI 1936). These ‘eyes of childhood’ coupled with the early acquired sensibility and imagination allow for the initial vision, the vision that startles and enlivens to portray moments of immense grandeur and spiritual importance. Messiaen would later describe the power of the phonetics of poetry that was evoked, especially by his mother, as the ‘musique de mots’ (Weller, 2007). Although this phonetic usage can be seen most clearly in his vocal music (for example Harawi), the subtle structure of Sauvage’s poetry evidently played an important part in Messiaen’s early orchestral career. This is evident in the structure that is displayed in Les Offrandes oubliées and Le Tombeau, which also couples with the structure of the self composed poems that act as a preface to the first three orchestral compositions. As already mentioned Messiaen was exposed in his early life to a wide range of poetry. By the time he started to compose as a career he had many a subject matter to choose from. In the words of Pierre Boulez (1986) it was his ‘boldness and calm courage in treating music as worldwide, universal phenomenon, […] fascinat[ing] us [as much] by the diversity of his options[as by] the elaborate simplicity of his choices’. Messiaen summarised the importance of L’Âme en bourgeon : ‘I remain firmly convinced that all the thoughts she harboured while she was pregnant and carrying me have influenced my destiny’ (Massin 1989). The relationship between Messiaen and his mother is significant, especially her early death at a time when Messiaen was vulnerable and close to composing his early orchestral works. However, the closeness was obviously strongly felt by Sauvage, as she says, ‘Olivier is my Rosenkavalier! […] We’re like two young lovers, quite innocent and pure’ (Sauvage 1929). Thus the closeness of their relationship, although by no means incestuous, must have allowed Messiaen to truly understand his mother’s thoughts. The most striking nature of her poetry, that of being able to portray the unsayable, was easily, although with genius, transferred to her Rosenkavalier. It is this action of portraying the unsayable that allows Messiaen to display spirituality in his music in such a convincing and powerful manner. The aim is to reveal the true presence of God, causing the listener, whatever their persuasion may be, to be stilled by a sense of awe.
CHAPTER FOUR
A brief afterthought of time. To gain a better understanding of the sense of power that pervades the early orchestral music of Messiaen, one needs to ascertain the major factors that allow for this power to be realised. Messiaen’s devout nature and his want to portray religious ideals through music are vital to this spiritual power, as are the factors that he received from his mother, that reflect much of her poetry. One other factor must be taken into account to understand fully how Messiaen achieved this unique power and that is Messiaen’s treatment of time. Although not occupying his thoughts and writings of the period, Messiaen would become fascinated by the properties and habits of time. It is reasonable to presume that, at the early stage in his compositional career, time was already of some importance to him. Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica (and quoted in Messiaen’s Traité I) says of time, ‘Time is the measure of the created, eternity is God himself. Eternity is indivisible as God is indivisible.’ Thus Messiaen was already influenced by time and the reproduction of the sense of eternity. By invoking a sense of eternity, one is nearer to an allusion of God. Messiaen would continue in his Traité I to define time and space as: ‘Space is a homogeneous environment, infinity of three dimensions: it is absolute space, Euclidian space. Time flows evenly whatever the rapidity of movement, and it would similarly flow if there was no movement: it is absolute time, Newtonian time.’
Through the quotations of Bergson, Moreux and Culliver in his Traité Messiaen developed the ‘Law of Attack-Duration Relationship’, which states: ‘With equal durations, a brief sound followed by silence appears longer than a prolonged sound’ (Traité I). It is clear that Messiaen achieved the spiritual power by combining his religious devotion, deep understanding of poetic description and an extremely conscious and careful application of temporal division.
CHAPTER FIVE
Conclusions Recent writings have begun to justify the importance of the orchestra at the beginning of Messiaen’s compositional career. Further to the importance of the orchestra, it is clear that Messiaen desired to portray the glory of God through his early orchestral compositions. The power that dominates the early orchestral music of Messiaen was enabled by his immersion in a poetic world, which displays the world with a potent clarity. This clarity was supported by a thorough understanding of the treatment of time in relation to rhythm. It is evident that orchestral composition played the central role in Messiaen’s early compositional career. The orchestra as his chosen medium could be due to many factors, including the early performance of Le Banquet eucharistique. He thus obtained crucial insight into the faults of his orchestration at an early stage, and also fuelled an excitement given by the power and scope of a full symphony orchestra. It is the vehicle of the orchestra that would then dominate his career and allow for the creation of his most important compositions. The organ obviously played a significant part in both the development of Messiaen as a composer and throughout his life. However it was not the medium through which he felt he could best portray his feelings, as its possibilities were to a degree limited when compared to an orchestra. The most important feature that Messiaen gained from playing the organ was the advancement of a modality that played a central role in the colouration of his harmonies and thus the production of light in his music. The organ allowed religion to stay at the forefront of Messiaen’s life, as his attendance at La Trinité would allow for continual reflection for the born believer. Religion prompted his utilisation of the orchestra as his principal medium in his early career. By using the orchestra he felt he could best portray the issues of God. It gave him the ability to employ the greatest range of colour and feeling. It also allowed him to display the power of God to nonbelievers and thus reach a much wider and larger audience. Religion also provided the source of inspiration for his composition. Through careful use of temporal division and the use of modality Messiaen produced a power in his music that speaks to most. It was by poetry that Messiaen was given the gift of being able to portray in music what he could see for himself. More importantly it was the poetry of Sauvage that demonstrated to him how natural power could be incorporated into poetry and thus allow him to transfer this concept to his music. It was also by this art form, that by creating his own poems and poetic language, he was given inspiration for the religiously guided composition. By the use of the orchestra and the two major dominating influences of religion and poetry Messiaen could create a new and enriched sound world, which in the centenary of his birth is just as powerful in performance as it is on the page.
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