The orchestra was in fact well trained in the performance of new music. In the olden days there were not nearly so many concert pianists, either. Even so I very soon felt I wanted to try something new and unfamiliar. To me it is one of the most complex and most enigmatic works Messiaen ever wrote. Nowadays it seems you can perform just anything, however new and peculiar.
Nothing shakes people in the same way.
It was sometime in the early 1970s. I was busy doing something at home and listening to the radio. The music they were playing soon caught my attention - so much so that I really sat down to listen. Right then and there I phoned you to ask whether you could possibly compose something for my next concert. And the result was the third sonata.