Messiaen Perspectives 2 ― Techniques, Influence and Reception

Focusing on Messiaena€?s relation to history - both his own and the history he engendered - the Messiaen Perspectives volumes convey the growing understanding of his deep and varied interconnections with his cultural milieux. Messiaen Perspectives 1: Sources and Influences examines the genesis, sources and cultural pressures that shaped Messiaena€?s music. Messiaen Perspectives 2: Techniques, Influence and Reception analyses Messiaena€?s compositional approach and the repercussions of his music. While each book offers a coherent collection in itself, together these complementary volumes elucidate how powerfully Messiaen was embedded in his time and place, and how his music resonates ever more today. Messiaen Perspectives 2: Techniques, Influence and Reception explores Messiaena€?s imprint on recent musical life. The first part scrutinizes his compositional technique in terms of counterpoint, spectralism and later piano music, while the second charts ways in which Messiaena€?s influence is manifest in the music and careers of Ohana, Xenakis, Murail and Quebecois composers. The third part includes case studies of Messiaena€?s reception in Italy, Spain and the USA. The volume also includes an ornithological catalogue of Messiaena€?s birds, collates information on the numerous a€?tombeauxa€? pieces he inspired, and concludes with a Critical Catalogue of Messiaena€?s Musical Works.

Christopher Dingle is Reader in Music at Birmingham Conservatoire, UK. He is the author of Messiaena€?s Final Works (2013), the acclaimed biography, The Life of Messiaen (2007), and co-editor of Olivier Messiaen: Music, Art & Literature (2007). He is also editor of The Cambridge History of Music Criticism (forthcoming). Robert Fallon is Assistant Professor of Musicology at Carnegie Mellon University, USA. He writes on contemporary classical music and relationships between music and nature, with a special focus on the work and thought of Olivier Messiaen.