Great Composers: Olivier Messiaen

Synesthete, ornithologist, composer.
This was a viewer request from KZbinr jamesaellis. If you've got a question or request for a future video, leave a comment, shoot me a message through KZbin, or use the email/Tumblr links below.
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Classical Nerd is a weekly video series covering music history, theoretical concepts, and techniques, hosted by composer, pianist, and music history aficionado Thomas Little.
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Music:
- Olivier Messiaen: Couleurs de la Cité céleste, performed by Avguste Antonov and the University of Kansas Wind Ensemble conducted by John Lynch
[free recording courtesy pianosociety.com]
- Thomas Little: Dance! #2 in E minor, Op. 1 No. 2, performed by Rachel Fellows, Michael King, and Bruce Tippette
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Contact Information:
Questions and comments can be directed to:
nerdofclassical [at] gmail.com
Tumblr:
classical-nerd.tumblr.com
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All images and audio in this video are for educational purposes only and are not intended as copyright infringement. If you have a copyright concern, please contact me using the above information.

[@charlesdavis7087]

Your mini-lectures are absolutely amazing, authority, insightful and even-handed. I am 76 and have two degrees in Music and am totally impressed with your KZbin series. I seat at your feet. Thank you.

[@davidschestenger3366]

Wonderful comment Charles I’m totally seduce by music, and the insight of this 15 minute are great Share totally your comment

[@quite1enough]

I was lucky to catch Turangalila-symphony live back in 2010-11. The pianist had a nose bleeding, but performed beautifully regardless. In my region performances of such unique pieces is a quite rarity.

[@ejb7969]

I think that's true in all regions, unfortunately.

[@qtaroj]

Thanks for making this! (Would have been even better if samples from his works were inserted, but I can't complain...) I find Messiaen oddly fascinating. There is so much sensuality in the sounds he creates - his works never sound too brainy or intellectual in spite of the demands they make on the listener. And there are aspects of his aesthetics that seems classical, for example his bird pieces seem to evoke the "art imitates nature" principle, but the result is totally progressive, avant-garde. PS. Great deadpan joke delivery around 12:08 there 😂

[@Musicandcatsmeow]

You’re so poetic and awesome introducing all of the great 20th century composers 🙌🌸🎶

[@UlfilasNZ]

Woah just discovered this channel. I thought I was the classical nerd...

[@JeffreyPhamigo]

Killing the exams to finish off my studies at our conservatory. Great video! Thanks.

[@davidschestenger3366]

Thank you, for the fabulous 15 minutes that will translate into hours of research Wonderfully pack in information

[@janburris2773]

Enjoyed, as always.

[@scribblertheband]

Very in depth I’ve really been enjoying your videos

[@federicodobisky1867]

such an excellent video. thanks

[@udomatthiasdrums5322]

love it!!

[@georgealderson4424]

Thank you sir. I am afraid that M.Messiaen's music sounds more like a lecture in mathematics so scary to me but I read that he was thought of as a lovely man so you cannot do better than that. Blessings and peace

[@thekathal]

What about all his organ works!?

[@nigelhaywood9753]

It goes by quite quickly in the video so I'd like to add that the modes of limited transposition are, above all, symmetrical modes. The limited transposition bit is very distracting, even though, in the end it boils down to the same thing. The symmetry is the most important part. The twelve note, chromatic scale is symmetrical but it has NO transpositions! You can't get more 'limited' than that. The whole tone scale can be transposed once. The octatonic or diminished scale can be transposed twice and so on. This was an interesting, informative and fun video. I especially like the joke about his new wife crying when Messiaen presented her with a piece to play. 😀

[@colomax]

Hi, great video. Can I make a suggestion? could you make a video of the books you have on your shelf if possible? Cheers

[@ClassicalNerd]

I did one back in the day! My bookshelf has grown immensely since then, though. A remake may be in order soon.

[@EmreNurbeyler]

12:12 hahahahaha that one caught me off guard

[@Mackeson3]

Are you familiar with the music of Charles Koechlin? (1867- 1950) He uses The Ondes Martenot to great effect in many of his pieces.

[@ClassicalNerd]

I've heard several Koechlin pieces, but none that-to my recollection-had any electronics involved.

[@Mackeson3]

@@ClassicalNerd kzbin.info/www/bejne/sJW2onusqbljaac Starting about 12 minutes into the piece. He also uses it in his "Seven Stars Symphony"

[@pianomanhere]

@@ClassicalNerd Yes, Thomas, PLEASE do a video on Charles Koechlin. Koechlin's entire cycle "Le Livre de la Jungle" is an unjustly neglected masterpiece. The opening triptych of choral / vocal soloist pieces known as "Trois Poemes du Livre de La Jungle" are remarkable, with the first piece being sublime. The remaining sections are La Loi de la Jungle - Les Bandar-Log - La Course de Printemps - Meditation de Purun Bhagat (My favorites among these are the latter two I listed). All, supremely beautiful works and a cycle whose overall neglect and consistent absence from the international orchestral repertoire are a crying shame and a scandal. Another piece called "Le Buisson Ardent" (The Burning Bush) is a great work, too, with some vague references to a couple themes heard in "The Jungle Book." (By the way, this burning bush is not a Biblical reference, but rather to an episode in Romain Rolland's vast toe-breaker of a novel "Jean-Christophe.")

[@trabouliste1037]

Did you mention that "Louange à l'Éternité de Jésus" (wich is part of the quatuor pour les fin du temps) is arranged from the earlier composition, "IV. L'Eau" from "Fête des belles eaux" for 6 Ondes Martenots, performed at the Paris International Exposition of 1937?

[@audunstolpe7408]

Impressive vids. Working through your backlog. Conlon nancarrow? Done him?

[@ClassicalNerd]

Duly noted: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@JEDART]

I'd like for you to talk about where concert music is heading for the future as well as your thoughts on the compositional language used today.

[@DottoreSM]

when i heard the name olivier messiaen i tought he was a medieval composer i mistook him for palestrina

[@eemelin6660]

It’s sometimes weird how musicologists want to define serialism solely as what it was in its initial stages and not what became of it. Same with tone rows and ”so and so did not use the method exactly” when talking about pretty much anyone except Webern...

[@eemelin6660]

Also I forgot to like like half of the videos in the series and now I have to watch them again and it makes me happy

[@ClassicalNerd]

I understand what you mean, but it's also necessary to define the Webern-Boulez-Babbitt-Stockhausen school of strict/total serialism as separate from the Berg-Stravinsky-Copland-Messiaen school of occasional serialist influence. If we lumped all composers who ever dabbled in serial technique into one list, said list would be encompass almost all Western twentieth-century composers, and wouldn't be as useful.

[@eemelin6660]

That being said, Witold Lutoslawski next? :)

[@ClassicalNerd]

Lutosławski has been bumped up in the request pool.

[@goonyougoodthing]

I'd love to see one of these on cage or glass/reich

[@ClassicalNerd]

One of my earliest videos was on Cage [watch?v=Ws5wDD_5TwE], while a video on the history of minimalism in general is already in the request queue.

[@goonyougoodthing]

Cheers man ,I only just discovered your chanel. Great job.

[@autsni]

@@ClassicalNerd Can I make a counter request for Glass....

[@GUILLOM]

@@autsni no

[@samuelmincarelli5051]

@@GUILLOM h

[@joerhodes8785]

Really enjoy your videos. How about information about Morton Feldman ? My personal favorite from him is piano and string quartet.

[@ClassicalNerd]

Morton Feldman has been bumped up in the request pool at www.lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@_rstcm]

What was the name of that 14 movement symphony / oratorio / concerto????

[@ClassicalNerd]

_La Transfiguration de Notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ._

[@_rstcm]

@@ClassicalNerd Thanku!

[@allesvergaengliche]

Pierre Boulez and Karol Szymanowski plz

[@ClassicalNerd]

You've already requested Szymanowski. You're the fifth person to request Boulez: lentovivace.com/classicalnerd.html

[@suvrochakraborty512]

what is the piece played in the introduction?

[@ClassicalNerd]

All music used in my videos is listed in the video descriptions.

[@jeffreylohr4460]

Can Morton Feldman get a video?

[@ClassicalNerd]

You're in luck: kzbin.info/www/bejne/jKGvaWOhmZ6kmbs

[@andreibaradayenka2016]

where did he get so much paper?

[@ClassicalNerd]

During the early years of the war, supplies were a lot easier to come by. I don't think Messiaen could have written the _Quartet_ by 1942.

[@krismariasy9728]

George Crumb next!

[@ClassicalNerd]

Sorry, I don't do living composers; their careers aren't finished, making comprehensive retrospectives impossible.

[@brahmabile]

@@ClassicalNerd RIP Crumb

[@yasmineabigailgonzalez-val3407]

PLAY THE MUSIC!!

[@ClassicalNerd]

Your caps lock seems to be broken

[@ShorkGamer]

I never heard of this composer before. Weird compositions he has.

[@TomCL-vb6xc]

ShorkGamer 0 His quartet for the end of time is imo one of the greats musical accomplishments in history . It not only epitomises but sometimes transcends modernist music .

[@MuzikJunky]

I see that you’re very open-minded! Could you do a video on Charlemagne Palestine, please? Peace.

[@pseudotonal]

It's hard to find a Messiaen work that is exclusively Roman Catholic and not simply, universally Christian. Everything he wrote could have been written by a Protestant except maybe his opera.

[@erniepianezza8940]

Dude, that part about his 2nd wife was hysterical! Wd u concider MUSICAL stand up comedy?? I think u cd be a kind of Youngin' Victor Borga! 😂 Peace