Olivier Messiaen
Quarour Pour La Fin Du Temps

[1] Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven, wrapped in a cloud, with a rainbow over his head; his face was like the sun and his legs like pillars of fire…

[5]Then the angel I had seen with one foot on the sea and one foot on the land, raised his right hand to heaven

[6]and swore by Him who lives forever and ever; who created heaven, earth, sea, and everything in them: "There will be no more delay!

[7]But in the days when the seventh angel is about to sound his trumpet, the mystery of God will be accomplished…"

.: from The Holy Bible - The New Testament / The Revelation of John / II. The Prophetic Visions - 1. Preliminary of the "Great Day" of God / Chapter 10 - Imminence of the Final Judgment :.

It is precisely from these verses of the Revelation that Olivier Eugène Prosper Charles Messiaen (note: from here onwards it will be written only as Olivier or Messiaen or Olivier Messiaen) draws inspiration for the composition of the “Quatuor pour la fin du temps”, a work that can easily be included in the category of sacred music.

Olivier Messiaen was a personality devoted to mystical research, seeking throughout his life the religious meaning of existence, which he achieved through a universe of symbols.

To understand the musical art of Olivier, one must familiarize oneself with the concept of synaesthesia: the term synaesthesia derives from Greek and is a word composed of the prefix syn (meaning with) and the verb aisthanomai, i.e., to perceive. It is a rhetorical figure that involves bringing together, in a single expression or image, two impressions derived from different sensory spheres, that is, from two different senses (it is akin to metaphor but is not a metaphor); a classic example of synaesthesia can be the expression sweet words, a unique expression to convey a unified meaning that derives from two different sensory components (in this case taste and hearing).

All of Olivier's art is structured based on a synaesthetic symbolism. There is continuity between Messiaen and Aleksandr Nikolaevič Skrjabin in this domain: Skrjabin had created the chromatic scale of musical notes based on a synaesthetic procedure that united the auditory sensations given by music with the visual sensations that various colors communicated to him (deepening a method that had already been defined by Wilhelm Richard Wagner), the ultimate goal of this device is to tend toward mysticism.

Olivier undertakes a similar experiment by expanding the synaesthetic sphere to all five senses, with the conviction that synaesthesia is the basis of the creative act.

With this fundamental concept clarified, it must be noted that Olivier, to break free from the tight constraints of tonality, searches for new musical solutions, adopting a novel modal approach that is foreign to the European tradition of his time.

Olivier understood the importance of the historical musical vanguards from Achille-Claude Debussy's impressionism to Arnold Franz Walther Schönberg's dodecaphony, (and his students) Anton Friedrich Wilhelm von Webern and Alban Marie Johannes Berg, but at the same time felt the need to use these historical vanguards to create something new. Thus, Olivier is rightly considered a conduit, a bridge between the musical vanguards of the early 20th century and the neo-vanguards of the latter half. To construct a new and personal style, Olivier revolutionizes not so much the musical style in the name of dissonance (dissonances do not exist in Olivier Messiaen) but adopts a different compositional mode (thus it is about basic method in constructing the work) that embraces musical formulas different from the classical European tradition, formulas taken from Indian music or medieval Gregorian chant (the dodecaphonic procedure of the early 20th century serves only as an applicative model to achieve this objective).

An important part of the revolution that Olivier brought to rhythm is his departure from classical Western rules by abstracting the very concept of rhythm from being bound to chronological time, through the use of some variables that (depending on the desired result) increase or decrease the rhythmic scales, abstraction because for Olivier rhythm must be "ab-stracta" or extracted out of time. Chronological time is not its measure because Olivier conceives the creative composition of a musical work that stands outside of time, in the sense that it is beyond time.

This is the starting point for the conception of a transcendental work, a work that is tied to divine transcendence and not to human events or the sense of its historical becoming.

In short, starting from the concept of compositional synaesthesia (the first step to frame Messiaen's work), it has been shown how the French composer was a bridge between the vanguards of the early 20th century and the latter, it then highlighted the revolution in rhythm and the construction of a rhythm that transcends immanent time, aiming for transcendence and divine judgment. Once these points are clarified, one can understand what is the key work of the transcendental vision in Messiaen's compositional art, namely the “Quartet for the End of Time” (a quartet for violin, cello, piano, and clarinet).

The Quartet is dedicated to the Apocalypse (ahem, the End of Time), which is the sublimation of the power of divine judgment that cathartically transcends the horrors of humanity, horrors that Olivier experienced firsthand, being a French Jew interned in a German concentration camp. It was during his imprisonment that he conceived and composed the Quartet. Listening to this work, one can perceive the liberating catharsis of a man who has seen evil: but from evil can arise redemption and salvation through God's judgment. The act of transposing the horrors of Nazism into music becomes a liberating experience, to express that from the evil and malice of humans can come one’s salvation, and before the power of God, all the evil actions of humans dissolve into dust, akin to the concept of memento mori: dust we were and dust we shall return. A work so exalted would probably never have seen the light without the horrific experience lived in the concentration camp.

To further understand Messiaen's art, it can be compared to that of Alberto Burri. The only thing that unites Burri to Messiaen is having lived through the horrors of war, albeit differently: Burri, as a military medic, was faced with many deaths, mutilations, and the blood of the wounded, while Messiaen as an interned in a Nazi concentration camp lived for years in contact with the skeletal bodies of prisoners, with torture, humiliation, gas chambers, and the most absurd and inconceivable aspects of human malice. However, Burri with his material compositions using plastics, ties, or burns on blood-red fields, aimed to portray human suffering which is then surpassed by a great drive of “ενέργεια” (“energheia”, a Greek concept expressing vital force), while Messiaen metabolizes human horror and suffering caused by the malice of other men to annul it in a mystical catharsis aimed at divine salvation.

Alberto Burri remains within immanence and Olivier Messiaen achieves transcendence (with his almost prophetic surname reminiscent of the Messiah).

This work is composed of 7 parts plus 1 interlude.

The number 7 is symbolic: 6 are the days of the world's creation plus the 7th which is the holy divine rest.

The 7 is the number of God.

But there's not only the symbol of the 7; in this work, there is also the symbolism of prime numbers, linked to the atemporal disharmony of rhythm.

The 3, the 5, the 7, the 11, the scale of indivisible prime numbers as a metric to represent the One and the transcendent.

This is why Messiaen is a mystical composer, like Skrjabin who aims for compositional synaesthesia to reach transcendence. He starts from this method to craft a work that becomes a mystical vision of nature, like the birdsong (a theme very dear to Olivier who, besides being a composer, pianist, and organist was also an ornithologist), which is a symphony of nature revealing a synaesthesia of divine light given by the encounter between the natural sound perceived by hearing and the sight of light. The ultimate goal that every visible, auditory, olfactory, gustatory, tactile phenomenon is nothing but a manifestation of the divine presence and a praise to God itself, and even evil does not escape this exalted conception (always according to Olivier): it becomes a means to be overcome in order to pay homage to God's judgment.

Okay, let's move on to the analysis of the work in its individual parts (the beloved-hated track by track…):

The First, “Liturgie de cristal”, already in this first movement the violin and clarinet evoke the birdsong in an onomatopoeic way to which the soft notes of the piano render service.

For Olivier, birdsong is translated into music for its strong symbolic value as the melody of nature revealing the light of God, it is based on a rhythm derived from Indian origins. The “Liturgie de cristal” is nothing more than the birdsong (it's a metaphysical experience that ascends from the forest to the sky, showing the latter in its clear, crystalline, and adamantine harmony).

In the Second, “Vocalise, pour l'Ange qui annonce la fin du Temps”, we hear at the beginning all the instruments fiercely evoke the power of the angel, then a gentle dialogue between violin and cello over a soft cascade of piano notes recalling the vision of the rainbow above the angel (the rainbow for Olivier is another symbol, another object of compositional synaesthesia, it is the chromatic variation of the synergy between musical note/color, and also a symbol of harmony and supreme, divine peace), finally, again the coda takes up the theme of the angel's power.

The Third, “Abîme des oiseaux”, a somber clarinet solo evokes the darkness of the abyss of time and also the darkness due to the evil actions of man, suddenly everything transforms into an ocean of light, that divine light evoked by the birdsong. The clarinet is the sole protagonist of this movement, seamlessly transitioning from an abyss of darkness to an abyss of light, illustrating that within darkness exists divine light.

Intermède, is a brief interlude between the 7 parts, actually, it is 1 bridge between the first 3 movements and the last 4, as it contains the elements of the first and anticipates the last, thus the introduction of this Interlude serves to connect the two groups of movements in the composition and its individual parts.

The Fourth, “Louange à l'Éternité de Jésus”, strictly from a religious standpoint, Olivier acknowledges the importance of the Church of Rome but rejects the dogmatic element. His vision is similar to Jewish mysticism.

An intense melody of cello and piano is dedicated to the power of the divine word incarnated in Christ; it is a praise in the sacred and mystical sense, yet far from dogmas and is represented by a melody full of pathos, a praise to Jesus with almost Franciscan tones.

The Fifth, “Danse de la Fureur, pour les Sept Trompettes”, here all instruments launch fiercely to announce the blasts of the Seven Trumpets that herald the Apocalypse and the coming of divine judgment.

The fury is expressed through the symbolic use of 7 asymmetric rhythms, and 7 melodies that change with the varying rhythms (on the iconological plane, this Fury is a Dance of liberation symbolizing the catharsis of the imminent judgment of God).

The Sixth, “Fouillis d'arcs-en-ciel, pour l'Ange qui Annonce la Fin du Temps”, after the trumpet blasts returns the rainbow theme again, rather a swirl of rainbows over the head of the announcing angel where the movement alternates the gentle words of the Angel with the luminous whirl of this Vortex.

The Seventh and final part is “Louange à l'Immortalité de Jésus”, here cello and piano, as in continuity with the 4th movement, or rather its completion with the addition of the violin. Unlike the 4th movement, this second Praise concluding the work is dedicated to the Immortality of Jesus, but also to man's salvation which can finally ascend to the heavens and reach God, so that the catharsis may finally be said to be complete!

P.S. The premiere of this event was performed with Etienne Pasquier, Jean Le Boulaire, Henry Akeka alongside Oliver Messiaen on January 15, '41 in Stalag VIII-A, a labor camp at Görlitz, in front of about four hundred between prisoners and guards, and that's it…