Title: Messiaen's explorations of love and death
First published: 2008
Description: "Olivier Messiaen's lifelong quest centered on the "colors" and rhythms of a music that would serve as a vehicle for his thoughts about time, his love of God, and his enthusiasm for birdsong. An additional topic about which he felt deeply is that of passionate, fated human love and its relationship to death on the one hand, the love of God on the other. During the years 1936-1948, he composed five cycles of vocal music to his own texts as well as the Turangalila Symphony, the monumental centerpiece of his "Tristan Trilogy." The focus of this study is the in-depth analysis and interpretation of these six works on love, with particular regard for their unusual wealth of poetic, sonic, and visual colors and imagery.

The wonder of rainbows, the magic of exotic sounds, the fantasy of Surrealist representations, and the majestic inexorability of fate in myths of various times and cultures define Messiaen's lyrics as much as his idiosyncratic, highly symbolic musical language, which never fails to build bridges between this and another world."--Jacket.
Subjects: History and criticism, Tristan (Legendary character), Death in music, Music, Songs and music, Love in music, Criticism and interpretation
People: Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)
Time periods: 20th entury
LC classification: ML410.M595 B785 2008