Two songs from Harawi this week (so we can complete the twelve by the end of our sessions). L’escalier redit [The echoing stairway out of corporeal existence] and the self-explanatory Amour oiseau d’étoile [Lovebird of stars].
Turangalîla reaches its development section – if you remember the original plan was for an almost traditional four movement layout. The movement begins and ends with percussion, a short piano cadenza and the ‘statue’ motif; its central section deals mainly with the work’s other main themes – the love theme (of course!) and the ‘flower’ theme.
Olivier Messiaen:
Harawi
IX. L’escalier redit &
X. Amour oiseau d’étoile
Turangalîla-symphonie:
Turangalîla 2
I. Introduction 0:00:48
II. Chant d’amour 1 0:07:31 ∙
III. Turangalîla 1 0:15:58 ∙
IV. Chant d’amour 2 0:21:30
V. Joie du sang des étoiles 0:32:56
VI. Jardin du sommeil d’amour 0:39:53 ∙
VII. Turangalîla 2 0:52:02
VIII. Développement de l’amour 0:55:45
IX. Turangalîla 3 1:07:25
X. Final 1:12:38 ∙
Ernest Chausson:
Ernest Chausson (1855-1899) died in a bicycling accident at the age of forty-four just when he was establishing himself as a composer of some significance.
Chausson, in part, bridges the, then, increasingly widening chasm between the ‘purely French’ school of Debussy et al. and the German influenced group of César Franck and d’Indy.
As you may guess from the photo below (where he’s acting as page turner for Debussy and his admirers), he was a close friend of the young composer. But his music, while it does occasionally develop an ‘Impressionist’ accent, is for the greater part rooted in the vocabulary of Franck and Wagner.
Symphony in B-flat
Lent – Allegro vivo (0:00)
Très lent (11:55)
Animé (21:24)
Poème de l’amour
et de la mer, Op.19
00:00 La Fleur des eaux
12:06 Interlude
14:46 La mort de l’amour
Garden Party
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The Art of Listening 