Turangalila is a screaming masterpiece. I first saw it live in December 1972 when Michael Tilson Thomas conducted the Los Angles Philharmonic in their first performance of the piece. I don't remember Messiaen in the audience, nor do I remember the piano and Ondes Martenot soloists, but I do remember that Thomas had the house lights turned off during the Jardin du Sommeil d’amour movement, only leaving on lights on the music stands. And thanks for recommending the Chailly Concertgebouw performance. I listened to it this evening, and there is no dwadling here. it is a a rush towards a climax (you know, love). I think that Turangalila and Quartet for the End of Time are two of the towering masterpieces of the 20th Century. I am so happy they exist.
That was, I believe, the first performance that DIDN'T use Mrs. Messiaen as piano soloist. The pianist was Ralph Grierson, Tilson Thomas' buddy with whom he'd recorded "The Rite of Spring" in the two-piano version. I don't remember the name of the Ondes player - any readers with longer memories than mine?
@@Brucknerphile The Ondes Martenot soloist was Jean Laurendeau. The concert began at 8:30, as a concert should instead of the 7:30 the SF Symphony starts at these days. Also, Tilson Thomas gave a 45-minute pre concert lecture with excerpts from Vignt regards sur l’enfant Jesus played by Edward Auer. (I found all of this in an ad placed in the L.A. Times on December 14, 1972).
I saw this years ago when David Robertson and the St Louis Symphony Orchestra brought it to Carnegie Hall (maybe it was Lincoln Center). They played the first minute or so, then stopped suddenly. Robertson wheeled around to the audience and said, "What... on *earth*... is THAT??" It was very funny, and he gave a brief talk about the piece. He invited the audience to applaud after "Joie du sang des étoiles," which we all did enthusiastically. It was a thrilling concert.
I heard it with Ozawa/Boston (with the traveling Messiaen/Loriod road show) at Carnegie Hall many years ago. Nelsons/Boston are doing it at Symphony Hall in April and I have my ticket.
I attended a performance of Turangalila seated in row 13 of the Teatro Monumental in Madrid around 1991, with the composer seated in row 12 and his wife at the piano. I don't remember who the conductor was. A year or two later I saw it conducted by Riccardo Chailly, but Messiaen was no longer among us. Yvonne Loriod did play the piano part nonetheless. Musicians have commented about Messian's synesthesia that, at a rehearsal of his music, he once mentioned to the musicians that they were playing very green, but he wanted them to play more orange. Yeah, I guess he was on to something there. Many years later, in 2011, I saw his opera St. Francis of Assissi, also in Madrid, but at a different, much larger venue, the Madrid Arena, because the scenic elements did not fit in the Teatro Real. His music is really distinct. A language of his own, and I enjoy it a lot.
I saw a performance of Turangalila with Zubin Mehta and NYPO in the 1990s. Messiaen was in the audience wearing a tuxedo with his pants up to his chest. And he had the score with him, following it as the performance progressed, even though he wrote it 40 years earlier. I wish I had the courage to come down and meet him after the performance. Oh well.
I was at one of those January 1988 performances, too. At the end of each movement - and there are 10 of them - large numbers of the audience simply got up and walked out. It was embarrassing. So much for “sophisticated” New York City music lovers. 😎🎹
The Theme d'amour in Turangalila quotes the Theme d'amour from Vingt Regards, which is a fragment of the Theme d'Dieu. So even though it is ostensibly a secular piece, it seems to me there are still religious undertones.
Would love to hear your thoughts on the new Seattle Symphony recording of Des Canyons aux Étoiles! I don’t know the piece well enough to know if I just like the piece or if it’s actually a good new recording of it!!!! You got me down the Messiaen rabbit hole the other year with your original Turangalila video…I have Ozawa, Chailly, Wit, and Salonen all on my shelf now, the complete Warner edition of all his stuff (so Previn as well), St Francis, and the Dorati recording of the Transfiguration. Thanks for all the Messiaen!!
The Naxos Witt recording is pretty dope as well, it's slower than some of the others but the music breathes beautifully through the passages, plus you get to hear all the cool stuff a little more clearly
Such a wildly amusing, exhilarating and hilarious piece. I laugh through most of it and that’s not a bad thing. A cousin to Raymond Scott and Carl Stalling IMO.
Saw this in Berlin last spring. Even though we had been to another live performance (Eschenbach & Philly), I never noticed that the evreything-but-the-kitchen sink percussion section does not include the most basic of percussion instruments: tympani.
I love this symphony, and I have every recording I can get of it (Ozawa is out of print, so this I have not). And I agree with Dave in his recommendations. But one recording I think it's a smoker, is Hans Vonk's with St. Louis orchestra. For me, the most exciting finale ever, with everyone going crazy at the very end.
As someone who has attended many concerts with Gimeno and the TSO, he always takes things fast. Sometimes that works (e.g. the Tchaikovsky 4 that he did two weeks ago) and sometimes it doesn't (e.g. this recording). It seems that they recorded the wrong piece with Gimeno. But I do have to compliment the audio engineers for managing to strategically edit out all the cell phone beeps that were present at the live recording.
Saw this recording done live, I was blown away by it in person, having never heard the piece. But, the recording just doesn't stack up when I returned to it after hearing Ozawa's. To be fair, even a poor performance of this piece would be dazzling in person.
David, when you reviewed the Antoni Wit (Naxos) recording for Classics Today, you mentioned the Ozawa, Previn, and Chailly as having extreme orchestral virtuosity, but you said that Wit beat them all in musicality and fidelity to the composer's instructions and you said it was your reference recording at the time. So I was surprised to see that Wit did not get mentioned in your review. Has that performance since fallen from favor?
Turangalila is a screaming masterpiece. I first saw it live in December 1972 when Michael Tilson Thomas conducted the Los Angles Philharmonic in their first performance of the piece. I don't remember Messiaen in the audience, nor do I remember the piano and Ondes Martenot soloists, but I do remember that Thomas had the house lights turned off during the Jardin du Sommeil d’amour movement, only leaving on lights on the music stands. And thanks for recommending the Chailly Concertgebouw performance. I listened to it this evening, and there is no dwadling here. it is a a rush towards a climax (you know, love). I think that Turangalila and Quartet for the End of Time are two of the towering masterpieces of the 20th Century. I am so happy they exist.
That was, I believe, the first performance that DIDN'T use Mrs. Messiaen as piano soloist. The pianist was Ralph Grierson, Tilson Thomas' buddy with whom he'd recorded "The Rite of Spring" in the two-piano version. I don't remember the name of the Ondes player - any readers with longer memories than mine?
@@Brucknerphile The Ondes Martenot soloist was Jean Laurendeau. The concert began at 8:30, as a concert should instead of the 7:30 the SF Symphony starts at these days. Also, Tilson Thomas gave a 45-minute pre concert lecture with excerpts from Vignt regards sur l’enfant Jesus played by Edward Auer. (I found all of this in an ad placed in the L.A. Times on December 14, 1972).
I saw this years ago when David Robertson and the St Louis Symphony Orchestra brought it to Carnegie Hall (maybe it was Lincoln Center). They played the first minute or so, then stopped suddenly. Robertson wheeled around to the audience and said, "What... on *earth*... is THAT??" It was very funny, and he gave a brief talk about the piece. He invited the audience to applaud after "Joie du sang des étoiles," which we all did enthusiastically. It was a thrilling concert.
Lucky devil.
I heard it with Ozawa/Boston (with the traveling Messiaen/Loriod road show) at Carnegie Hall many years ago. Nelsons/Boston are doing it at Symphony Hall in April and I have my ticket.
I attended a performance of Turangalila seated in row 13 of the Teatro Monumental in Madrid around 1991, with the composer seated in row 12 and his wife at the piano. I don't remember who the conductor was. A year or two later I saw it conducted by Riccardo Chailly, but Messiaen was no longer among us. Yvonne Loriod did play the piano part nonetheless. Musicians have commented about Messian's synesthesia that, at a rehearsal of his music, he once mentioned to the musicians that they were playing very green, but he wanted them to play more orange. Yeah, I guess he was on to something there.
Many years later, in 2011, I saw his opera St. Francis of Assissi, also in Madrid, but at a different, much larger venue, the Madrid Arena, because the scenic elements did not fit in the Teatro Real. His music is really distinct. A language of his own, and I enjoy it a lot.
This is a stunning work, which I first discovered in a live performance at the Warsaw Philharmonic. Ear-opening! A memorable evening!
OK....now the Toronto Symphony holds the record for the most recordings of this work.
I saw a performance of Turangalila with Zubin Mehta and NYPO in the 1990s. Messiaen was in the audience wearing a tuxedo with his pants up to his chest. And he had the score with him, following it as the performance progressed, even though he wrote it 40 years earlier. I wish I had the courage to come down and meet him after the performance. Oh well.
I was at one of those January 1988 performances, too. At the end of each movement - and there are 10 of them - large numbers of the audience simply got up and walked out. It was embarrassing. So much for “sophisticated” New York City music lovers. 😎🎹
@@MarshallArtz007 I don’t remember that in the performance I saw. But I do remember Messiaen getting a standing ovation at the end.
I was there as well. Those were the times you went to a concert to hear something new
I was there too.
@@hermanblinkhoven1856: …And to see in person one of the last living great composers. 😎🎹
The Theme d'amour in Turangalila quotes the Theme d'amour from Vingt Regards, which is a fragment of the Theme d'Dieu. So even though it is ostensibly a secular piece, it seems to me there are still religious undertones.
Love this piece. My first exposure with antoni wit on Naxos. Which is amazing.
Would love to hear your thoughts on the new Seattle Symphony recording of Des Canyons aux Étoiles!
I don’t know the piece well enough to know if I just like the piece or if it’s actually a good new recording of it!!!!
You got me down the Messiaen rabbit hole the other year with your original Turangalila video…I have Ozawa, Chailly, Wit, and Salonen all on my shelf now, the complete Warner edition of all his stuff (so Previn as well), St Francis, and the Dorati recording of the Transfiguration.
Thanks for all the Messiaen!!
Your depiction of the two soloist was hilarious!
8:20 : That's the real sound of Ondes Martenot ! Bravo David 👏
ROTFLOL! Now I need a shot of Turangalila, will play the Chailly! 🦜🦜🦜
The Naxos Witt recording is pretty dope as well, it's slower than some of the others but the music breathes beautifully through the passages, plus you get to hear all the cool stuff a little more clearly
Yes, I should have mentioned it. It's a reference recording!
Yes.
Such a wildly amusing, exhilarating and hilarious piece. I laugh through most of it and that’s not a bad thing. A cousin to Raymond Scott and Carl Stalling IMO.
Saw this in Berlin last spring. Even though we had been to another live performance (Eschenbach & Philly), I never noticed that the evreything-but-the-kitchen sink percussion section does not include the most basic of percussion instruments: tympani.
I love this symphony, and I have every recording I can get of it (Ozawa is out of print, so this I have not). And I agree with Dave in his recommendations. But one recording I think it's a smoker, is Hans Vonk's with St. Louis orchestra. For me, the most exciting finale ever, with everyone going crazy at the very end.
As someone who has attended many concerts with Gimeno and the TSO, he always takes things fast. Sometimes that works (e.g. the Tchaikovsky 4 that he did two weeks ago) and sometimes it doesn't (e.g. this recording). It seems that they recorded the wrong piece with Gimeno.
But I do have to compliment the audio engineers for managing to strategically edit out all the cell phone beeps that were present at the live recording.
Saw this recording done live, I was blown away by it in person, having never heard the piece. But, the recording just doesn't stack up when I returned to it after hearing Ozawa's. To be fair, even a poor performance of this piece would be dazzling in person.
And what about Salonen on Sony? Personally I like it a lot. But is it a reference recording?
David, when you reviewed the Antoni Wit (Naxos) recording for Classics Today, you mentioned the Ozawa, Previn, and Chailly as having extreme orchestral virtuosity, but you said that Wit beat them all in musicality and fidelity to the composer's instructions and you said it was your reference recording at the time. So I was surprised to see that Wit did not get mentioned in your review. Has that performance since fallen from favor?
Nope. Just didn't mention it. My mistake!
May I put in a good word for the Antoni Wit performance on Naxos? Underpriced and underrated, in my view.
Sure. It's my reference version. I just neglected to mention it--my bad.