
Messiaen's Musical Techniques: The Composer's View and Beyond (Hardback)
Gareth Healey (author)
£125.00
Hardback
224 Pages /
Published: 18/03/2013
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Despite Messiaen's position as one of the greatest technical innovators of the twentieth century, his musical language has not been comprehensively defined and investigated. The composer's 1944 theoretical study, The Technique of My Musical Language, expounds only its initial stages, and while his posthumously published Traite de rythme, de couleur, et d'ornithologie contains detailed explanations of selected techniques, in most cases the reader is left to define these more precisely by observing them in the context of Messiaen's analyses of his own works. Technical processes are nevertheless in many cases the primary components of a work or movement. For instance, personnages dominate 'Joie du sang des etoiles' from the TurangalA ®la-symphonie, and in certain cases, such as 'L'echange' from the Vingt regards sur l'Enfant-Jesus, the process (asymmetric augmentation) is the only structuring element present. Given this reliance on idiosyncratic techniques, clear comprehension of the music is impossible without a detailed knowledge of Messiaen's methods. Gareth Healey charts their development and interconnections, considers their relationship with formal structures, and applies them in refined and extended form to works for which Messiaen himself left no published analysis.
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd
ISBN: 9781409448259
Number of pages: 224
Weight: 544 g
Dimensions: 234 x 156 x 14 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
A Yankee Book Peddler US Core Title for 2013 'Messiaen's Musical Techniques has much to offer as a reference guide. Readers will benefit greatly from the information and accompanying explanations. Healey admirably interprets the material and ably points out various interconnections.' Notes
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