Composer: Olivier Eugène Prosper Charles Messiaen
Performer: Sarah Leonard
Orchestra: ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Michael Gielen
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Orfeo
Catalogue: C250131
Release: 2022
Size: 227 MB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: cover
01. Les offrandes oubliées, I/5a
Poèmes pour Mi, I/17b
02. I. Action de grâces
03. II. Paysage
04. III. La maison
05. IV. Épouvante
06. V. L’épouse
07. VI. Ta voix
08. VII. Les deux guerriers
09. VIII. Le collier
10. IX. Prière exaucée
Chronochromie, I/43
11. I. Introduction
12. II. Strophe I
13. III. Antistrophe I
14. IV. Strophe II
15. V. Antistrophe II
16. VI. Epode
17. VII. Coda
5th instalment of the Michael Gielen / ORF Radio Symphony Orchestra Vienna series on Orfeo. What makes Olivier Messiaen’s œuvre so special is, to a great extent, his ability to coalesce various influences, inspirations, and convictions into a wholly individual and perfectly coherent musical language. This includes the development of the modal harmonies of earlier centuries as much as it does an engagement with rhythms from non-European traditions. The wealth of colors in his works stems, in part, from Messiaen’s synaesthetic ability to perceive chords as various shapes and colors. As an enthusiastic ornithologist, he spent much time in nature, notating birdsong and then working those, in stylized form, into his compositions. But most importantly, Messiaen’s work is governed by his profound faith. Messiaen once said of himself that he didn’t primarily see himself as a composer but as an “ornithologist and rhythmist”. Captured in 1991 and 1996, remastered from original ORF archive tapes.