Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum/Couleurs de la cite celeste

Olivier Messiaen - Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum/Couleurs de la cite celeste

released on LP

I borrowed this LP a few years ago and ripped it then. The cover was beat up so I had to "borrow" the cover from somewhere on the net. The back cover has a little bit of handwriting on it. I do not know what the dates refer to (maybe when the music was recorded), but it was nice that someone wrote how to pronounce Olivier Messiaen's name.

Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum ("And I await the Resurrection of the Dead")

On the back cover, the entirety of side 1 is referred to as the beginning and the first track on side 2 is referred to as the conclusion.

Conducted by Pierre Boulez.
Performed by Groupe Instrumental a Percussion de Strasbourg and Orchestre du Domaine Musical.

This work was commissioned by André Malraux. It was composed and orchestrated in 1964. Its instrumentation intends it for vast spaces: churches, cathedrals, and even performances in the open air and on mountain heights....
It is perhaps useful to recall that, at the time he was writing his score, the composer gladly surrounded himself with strong and simple pictures - of the stepped pyramids of Mexico, the temples and statues of Ancient Egypt, Romanesque and Gothic churches; that he re-read the texts of St. Thomas Aquinas on "The Resurrection" and "The World of the Resuscitated"; that he worked in the high Alps, facing those powerful landscapes that are his true homeland.
May 7, 1965, at eleven o'clock in the morning: the date of the first, private, performance at the Sainte-Chapelle. This was the ideal setting for the work, as much for the marriage of the colors of the instrumental timbres and sonorous intricacies with the resplendence of blues, reds, gold and purples, as for the alternating resonances due to the encircling of the stained-glass windows. A second performance took place under the direction of Serge Baudo in the Cathédral de Notre Dame de Chartres before a large throng on Sunday, June 20, 1965, at the end of High Mass. This was given in the presence of Monseigneur Michon (the Bishop of Chartres) and of Général Charles de Gaulle. The third performance was given in Paris, at a concert of the Domaine Musical, under the direction of Pierre Boulez, with the players who take part in the present recording. The orchestra comprises three ensembles: woodwind, brass, and metallic percussion instruments. (from the liner notes)

Woodwind: 2 piccolos, 3 flutes, 3 oboes, 1 cor anglais, 1 E-flat clarinet, 3 clarinets, 1 bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon

Brass: 1 trumpet in D, 3 trumpets, 6 horns in F, 3 trombones, 1 bass trombone, 1 tuba, 1 bass saxhorn in B flat

Metallic Percussion: 3 sets of tuned cowbells, tubular bells, 6 gongs, 3 tam-tams

Couleurs de la cité céleste

Conducted by Pierre Boulez. Performers: Yvonne Loriod - piano ; Guy Deplus - first clarinet ; André Fournier - second clarinet ; Gaston Derytere - third clarinet ; Georges Van Gucat - xylophone ; Claude Ricou - xylorimba ; Jean Batigne - marimba ; Pierre Thibaud - trumpet in D ; René Allain - first trombone ; Jean-Paul Finkbeiner -tubular bells

These "inner colors" spring from five quotations from the Apocalypse:
1. "And there was a rainbow round about the throne." (Revelations IV: 3)
2. "And the seven angels had seven trumpets." (Revelations VIII: 6)
3. "And to the star was given the key to the bottomless pit." (Revelations IX: 1)
4. "And the light of the Holy City was like a jasper stone, clear as crystal." (Revelations XXI: 11) 5. "And the foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with all manner of precious stones: jasper, sapphire, chalcedony, emerald, sardonyx, sardius, chrysolite, beryl, topaz, chrysoprasus, jacinth, amethyst." (Revelations XXI: 19, 20)

The form of the piece depends entirely on colors. The themes, melodic or rhythmic, the complexes of sounds and timbres evolve like colors. In their perpetually renewed variations can be found (by analogy) colors that are warm and cold, complementary colors that influence their neighbors, shading down to white, or toned down by black. These transformations can be compared to the superimposition of plays enacted on several stages, the simultaneous unfolding of several different stories.

Plainsong Alleluias, Greek and Hindu rhythms, permutations of note values, the birdsong of different countries: all these accumulated materials are placed at the service of color and of the combinations of sounds that assume and call out for it.

The sound-colors, in their turn, are a symbol of the Celestial City and of Him who dwells there. Above all time, above all place, in a light without light, in a night without night.... That which the Apocalypse, still more terrifying in its humility than in its visions of glory, describes only in a blaze of colors.... To the song of two New Zealand birds (the Tui-Bird and the Bell-Bird) is opposed "the Abyss," with its pedal-notes for the trombones and the resonance of tam-tams. To the cries of the Brazilian Araponga is opposed "the colored ecstasy" of pedal points: sard red - red flecked with blue - orange, gold, milky-white - emerald green, amethyst violet - purple violet and blue violet... The work ending no differently from the way it began, but turning on itself like a rosewindow of flamboyant and invisible colors.

Couleurs de la cité céleste was composed in 1963. First performed on October 17, 1964, at the Donaueschingen Festival, under the direction of Pierre Boulez, the work was repeated on December 11, 1964, in Brussels (at the Reconnaissance des Musiques Modernes Festival), then in Paris on December 16, 1964, at a concert of the Domaine Musical, again under the direction of Pierre Boulez. In all these performances, Yvonne Loriod played the solo piano part. (from the liner notes by Olivier Messiaen)

Tracklisting:

Side 1

1. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: I. Des profondeurs de l'abîme, je crie vers toi, Seigneur: Seigneur, écoute ma voix! ("Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord: Lord, hear my voice.") (Psalm 130: 1, 2) {3:39}

2. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: II. Le Christ, ressuscite des morts, ne meurt plus; la mort n'a plus sur lui d'empire ("Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him.") (St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans VI: 9) {5:21}

3. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: III. L'Heure vient où les morts entendront la voix du Fils de Dieu ("The hour is coming when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God.") (St. John V: 25) {4:50}

4. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: IV. Ils ressusciteront, glorieux, avec un nom nouveau dans le concert joyeux des étoiles et les acclamations des fils du ciel ("They shall be raised in glory, with a new name, when the morning stars sing together, and all the sons of God shout for joy.") (St. Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians XV: 43; The Revelations of St. John II: 17; Job XXXVIII: 7) {8:41}

Side 2

1. Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum: V. Et j'entendis la voix d'une foule immense... ("And I heard the voice of a great multitude.") (The Revelation of St John XIX: 6) {6:37}

2. Coleurs de la cite celeste {16:44}

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