Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)

Started by bhodges, January 03, 2008, 09:35:19 AM

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Scarpia

#140
Quote from: Coco on May 03, 2011, 09:20:41 AM
I should do the same with Mozart — all I really know are the last five symphonies, the clarinet quintet and the Requiem.

The wind music is miraculous because of how much Mozart creates with limited means and in a limited form.  Actually, the Trios for three clarinets are unbelievable.   They were prepared by Mozart to be played at various Masonic functions, and are astonishing for their invention with only three voices.  Hard to find recordings of them, but this one is hard to top:

http://www.amazon.com/Sabine-Meyer-Mozart-Chamber-Clarinet/dp/B000LDM95K/ref=sr_1_28?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1304443471&sr=1-28



There are other recordings, but for me it is critical that all three parts are played by clarinets and/or basset horns.  I've seen recordings in which oboes and bassoons are used, which just don't do it justice.

(poco) Sforzando

Quote from: Mirror Image on May 03, 2011, 09:21:02 AM
Ah, we're onto personal insults now huh? A nice, mature thing to do.

You don't regard me as an equal? Ah that's so terrible, I'm just going to go cry myself to sleep. ::)

All of this mayhem because I actually said I don't like Messiaen's music.

As always with you, Mirror Image, pot-kettle-black. This "mayhem" is not about Messiaen's music.
"I don't know what sforzando means, though it clearly means something."

Philoctetes

Quote from: Leon on May 03, 2011, 09:30:35 AM
Usually these threads are set up, kind of like a party, where people who mutually admire a composer enjoy sharing which works and recordings they especially like  - but some people enjoy depositing a turd in the punch bowl.

"Discretion is the better part of valor" - and sometimes it is best to keep your opinion to yourself if all it serves to do is deflate the general mood surrounding a discussion among aficionados of a composer.

This post doesn't make any sense either. Plenty of people have made legitimate complaints about Messiaen. The only objections I've seen are in regards to people who write off by simply sampling.


Mirror Image

Quote from: Leon on May 03, 2011, 09:30:35 AM
Usually these threads are set up, kind of like a party, where people who mutually admire a composer enjoy sharing which works and recordings they especially like  - but some people enjoy depositing a turd in the punch bowl.

"Discretion is the better part of valor" - and sometimes it is best to keep your opinion to yourself if all it serves to do is deflate the general mood surrounding a discussion among aficionados of a composer.

So somebody isn't allowed to give their opinion? This is the Messiaen thread correct?

mjwal

Quote from: (poco) Sforzando on May 03, 2011, 09:01:58 AM
Look, I don't really care what the hell you do. But it's a helluva lot of fun at times pushing your buttons, and your intransigence and close-mindedness impress only yourself. Speaking as someone who dislikes a big technicolor production like Turangalila, but who does find the Quartet for the End of Time very beautiful and moving, I think your "opinion" of work you haven't heard and refuse to hear has no merit whatever. But do what you like; as a student I flunked in a freshman English course once said to me, "it don't bother me none."
Hahaha, love it, that's very funny, the best joke I've seen all week. I shall adopt that saying as a motto, if I may. Me, I love Turangalila, Quatuor pour la fin du temps, 3 petites liturgies, Visions de l'amen, Des canyons aux étoiles & a few others, but I have difficulty relating to organ music in general so I haven't been there much. I can see that some people might find it hard to relate to his music in general, though. The Quatuor in particular sends me to a very special place. I saw Messiaen once - it was at a concert in Frankfurt in which they played the 6th scene from his St Francis opera - what a delightful old man he was, you could tell how loving he was, probably quite OTL (in a wonderful way) as well  8).
The Violin's Obstinacy

It needs to return to this one note,
not a tune and not a key
but the sound of self it must depart from,
a journey lengthily to go
in a vein it knows will cripple it.
...
Peter Porter

Mirror Image

Quote from: (poco) Sforzando on May 03, 2011, 09:27:16 AM
As always with you, Mirror Image, pot-kettle-black. This "mayhem" is not about Messiaen's music.

I've sent you a PM.

Coco

Quote from: Il Barone Scarpia on May 03, 2011, 09:27:09 AM
The wind music is miraculous because of how much Mozart creates with limited means and in a limited form.  Actually, the Trios for three clarinets are unbelievable.   They were prepared by Mozart to be played at various Masonic functions, and are astonishing for their invention with only three voices.  Hard to find recordings of them, but this one is hard to top:

http://www.amazon.com/Sabine-Meyer-Mozart-Chamber-Clarinet/dp/B000LDM95K/ref=sr_1_28?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1304443471&sr=1-28



There are other recordings, but for me it is critical that all three parts are played by clarinets and/or basset horns.  I've seen recordings in which oboes and bassoons are used, which just don't do it justice.

I've responded on the Mozart thread.

Philoctetes

Quote from: Leon on May 03, 2011, 09:46:48 AM
Of course you can offer your opinion of Messiaen's music.  But if all your opinion amounts to is insulting the man and the music I hardly see what it adds to the discussion. 

However, if you were able to temper your remarks with a bit of acknowledgement of his accomplishments and then offer that you have never been able to truly enjoy his music despite listening to several works - that would seem a more tactful way of going about it.

It also helps if you might try to keep an open mind and at least appear to want to broaden your appreciation of his music since it is widely admired, and maybe even admit that the limitation is yours and not in the music - then this would constitute the basis for a worthwhile discussion, imo.

Otherwise, it is as I said before merely dropping a turd in the punchbowl.

It also might help if you listen to more than a handful of works, and if in that handful of works they cover more than one genre.

Gurn Blanston

Quote from: Mirror Image on May 03, 2011, 09:34:24 AM
So somebody isn't allowed to give their opinion? This is the Messiaen thread correct?

Well, if you can somehow see a good value-added in saying you don't like the music, and feel like this is going to enhance everyone else's experience, then sure, be as negative as you feel you have to be. That is how to make friends and influence people. I know that's not why you're here, of course, but it is useful sometimes to not have 90% of the people on the board thinking that you're an asshole. Then your experience is actually enhanced to some extent.

Anyway, there are plenty of composers that I don't care for. If I went around and shat on every discussion about them, well, life is too short.

8)
Visit my Haydn blog: HaydnSeek

Haydn: that genius of vulgar music who induces an inordinate thirst for beer - Mily Balakirev (1860)

Mirror Image

#149
Quote from: Gurnatron5500 on May 03, 2011, 10:00:52 AM
Well, if you can somehow see a good value-added in saying you don't like the music, and feel like this is going to enhance everyone else's experience, then sure, be as negative as you feel you have to be. That is how to make friends and influence people. I know that's not why you're here, of course, but it is useful sometimes to not have 90% of the people on the board thinking that you're an asshole. Then your experience is actually enhanced to some extent.

Anyway, there are plenty of composers that I don't care for. If I went around and shat on every discussion about them, well, life is too short.

8)

I offered a different perspective, people got offended, I'm now the bad guy. That's pretty much the sequence of events. This is a forum, Gurn. Forums strive on different perspectives, otherwise, all you have is a bunch of people agreeing with each other. I'm sorry, but that's not a forum I want to be apart of.

Accepting other people's opinions has been a hard thing for me to do especially if it's a composer I'm passionate about, but, in the end, people need to exhibit more patience with those that don't understand their beloved composer's music. I admit I don't understand Messiaen, but I also admitted that his idiom isn't appealing to me. The minute I criticized the man's music, I'm suddenly made into some kind of villain. This shouldn't be the case at all. I didn't jump all over people because they don't like Milhaud's music. I can understand why people wouldn't like his music, which means that I accept that there many quirks in the man's music that simply are off-putting, but it resonates with me just like Messiaen's music resonates with many people here. I accept that people do not like Milhaud, but it seems people can't accept that I do not like Messiaen. Strange turn of events indeed.

Scarpia

What got peoples back up was stating the music was objectively worthless, rather than saying you did not enjoy or appreciate it, and implicitly criticizing music you had not heard.

Mirror Image

Quote from: Il Barone Scarpia on May 03, 2011, 10:45:21 AM
What got peoples back up was stating the music was objectively worthless, rather than saying you did not enjoy or appreciate it, and implicitly criticizing music you had not heard.

Okay perhaps my judgement was a bit harsh. :) I now will say that I just don't care for his music and here are the reasons why. I do recall you making some negative remarks as well, which seemed pretty unnecessary. Didn't you insult the man by calling him loopy? I never insulted the man, I insulted the music, which I had every right to do.

Scarpia

Quote from: Mirror Image on May 03, 2011, 10:49:50 AM
Okay perhaps my judgement was a bit harsh. :) I now will say that I just don't care for his music and here are the reasons why. I do recall you making some negative remarks as well, which seemed pretty unnecessary. Didn't you insult the man by calling him loopy? I never insulted the man, I insulted the music, which I had every right to do.

I said his technique of encoding text in his music using a code of his own invention was loopy.  I still think it's loopy.   

Cato

Not long after Messiaen had composed Chronochromie, I came across the score (!) at a library in Dayton, and was fascinated, and not a little appalled, by what I saw, not unlike the reaction of a resurrected painter from the 16th century watching a 20th-century "drip" painter in action.

Still, I was intrigued enough to seek out a recording and follow along with the score.  I had no idea why most of the score was written in 32nd notes, but discovered that Messiaen had come up with a system of "32 durations" etc. etc.  (As I recall, the infamous section with 18 assorted voices playing  bird-calls is not written with a time signature of 32nds.)

So, no I was not impressed, and even though for various educational reasons I invested in the DGG CD of this work with Boulez and the Cleveland Orchestra, and have listened to it throughout the decades, I do not think it is a great work.  I believe it is an example of a man with great talent going rather willfully awry.

But, what is he trying to do in this work?  He wanted to depict mountains, and water, and birds, in a sort of "panaudic" riot of freedom.  In that I would say he was successful, in the same way that e.g. Mondrian was successful in his goals.
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

Mirror Image

Quote from: Cato on May 03, 2011, 11:20:33 AMI believe it is an example of a man with great talent going rather willfully awry.

I think it should be noted I never doubted Messiaen's talents and abilities as a musician. All I did was comment on the music that I heard, which seems to be one of the most dreadful things anybody could do on a forum. God forbid I share my thoughts! ::)

Coco

I don't think Cato was addressing you.

Quote from: Mirror Image on May 03, 2011, 11:42:00 AM
God forbid I share my thoughts! ::)

I doubt even a deity could stop you from doing that.

Cato

Quote from: Coco on May 03, 2011, 11:51:37 AM
I don't think Cato was addressing you.


True!  Please note the context: that is my opinion of Messiaen's impulse to create Chronochromie.   0:)
"Meet Miss Ruth Sherwood, from Columbus, Ohio, the Middle of the Universe!"

- Brian Aherne introducing Rosalind Russell in  My Sister Eileen (1942)

Gurn Blanston

Quote from: Mirror Image on May 03, 2011, 11:42:00 AM
I think it should be noted I never doubted Messiaen's talents and abilities as a musician. All I did was comment on the music that I heard, which seems to be one of the most dreadful things anybody could do on a forum. God forbid I share my thoughts! ::)

You aren't going to go all passive/aggressive on me now, are you? If you have something to say about the music then say it. I listened to X and it didn't suit me because... is often a much appreciated opener even by people who it DOES suit. At least it is a basis for discussion beyond "Messiaen sucks :P " :)

8)
Visit my Haydn blog: HaydnSeek

Haydn: that genius of vulgar music who induces an inordinate thirst for beer - Mily Balakirev (1860)

karlhenning

An intelligent, thoughtful, and musical response.  And after all, Cato, it isn't as if you suggested that Messiaen's star is fading ; )

Philoctetes

Quote from: Mirror Image on May 03, 2011, 11:42:00 AM
I think it should be noted I never doubted Messiaen's talents and abilities as a musician. All I did was comment on the music that I heard, which seems to be one of the most dreadful things anybody could do on a forum. God forbid I share my thoughts! ::)

I'm now convinced that you're PaulB.