A story heard from CBC radio back on March 10, 2013: "Messiaen composed the quartet in a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp during World War II, after being captured as a French soldier. Fortunately for Messiaen, and for music history, one of the German guards was a music lover, and a kind of unsung hero, too. His name was Karl-Albert Brüll. He was terribly excited by the fact that a significant composer was in the camp. He supplied Messiaen with compositional tools: pencils, paper, erasers, and he also ensured Messiaen would be given the time and space to work. Brull was apparently kind to other prisoners, too, and he helped facilitate Messiaen’s eventual return to Paris. The Quartet for the End of Time [...] It’s become Messiaen’s most famous composition. His lasting legacy. Without Brull, this music would never have existed. Decades later Brull tried to visit Messiaen, knocking at his door in Paris, but Messiaen declined to see him. No one knows why - maybe he didn’t want to be reminded of his time as a prisoner of the Nazis. Perfectly reasonable. But eventually Messiaen changed his mind - he wanted to reach out to the man who had made it possible for him to write his masterpiece. He wrote him a letter - but it was too late - soon after that unanswered knock, Brull was hit by a car, and he died."
+Moonlit Sorrow The German officer in "The Pianist" was Captain Wilhelm Adalbert Hosenfeld, who died in a Soviet prison camp. Similar story--different person--it might have happened more often than we can ever know.
Mr Pinhedz Thank you for filling in the blanks for me. Yes, unfortunately, it's hard telling how many times such things happened. A shame - he was a remarkable pianist.
How terribly sad that Messiaen couldn't overcome his probable distaste for that decent guard, likely a rarity of a gentleman in that occupation. While understanding his bitterness against the Nazi régime and government, Herr Brüll definitely deserved a much better reception; particularly given how it was he who helped Messiaen have a chance to write this work. May God Grant both men reconciliation in Heaven... Beautiful piece, even if much of it is jarring to traditionally-inclined ears. Perhaps the last movement is the most haunting of all - it's a paraphrase and transposition (from C-major into E-major) of the second half of his "Diptyque" for organ-solo, which features a harmonic-flute solo against the organ's string-stops.
A Messiaen premiere in a German prisoner of war camp: The modern French composer Olivier Messiaen played the piano part in one of the strangest premiere performances of the 20th century on January 15, 1941. As the composer put it: "My Quartet for the End of Time was conceived and written during my captivity as a prisoner of war and received its world premiere at Stalag 8a in Görlitz, Silesia." One of the four performers was cellist Etienne Pasquier, who offered this recollection: "We were captured at Verdun. Our entire company was initially held in a large field near Nancy. Among our comrades was a clarinetist who had been allowed to keep his clarinet. Messiaen started to write a piece for him while we were still in this field as he was the only person there with an instrument. And so Messiaen wrote a solo piece that was later to become the third movement of the Quartet. The clarinetist practiced in the open field and I acted as his music stand. The piece seemed to him to be too difficult from a technical point of view and he complained about it to Messiaen. "You'll manage,' was Messiaen's only reply." Pasquier reports that the performance was a great success, and led to the release of Messiaen and his three colleagues, as the Germans assumed-wrongly, it turns out-that the four musicians must have all been non-combatants.
I came to this through reading Richard Powers' novel "Orfeo". Highly recommended. As well as being an excellent novel in its own right, it has extended sections giving the history behind - and an appreciation of - this and several other classical pieces. Trust me; read it.
Came to this at an odd angle via an Astronomer, expecting music for withered earths and dying suns...it could still be overlaid on those visits, but in it's own contexts gives us the realization that under certain conditions the end of time can be any time, any place and under any crushing conditions both spiritual and temporal
Great work, really one of the more significant pieces of mid-century music. What is jarring about it, though is Messiaen's abandonment of counterpoint - besides the obvious solo movements, that is. In the first movement, he sets up the idea of parallel cycles. We're expecting something that resembles two (or more) musical lines that are both independent and interactive in some ways. But in the first movement, the parts go on without any interaction. Yet, it holds together. That is one of the reasons why it is so stunning, this "charm of impossibility".
Clarinetist Richard Nunemaker: "Yes! I was circular breathing. It's what glass blowers do. I breath in through my nose while blowing air out through my mouth. Much fun."
This is absolutely the strangest music that has ever reached my ears. Almost simultaneously confounding and enthralling. Amazing performance. And just because, anyone reach this because they read about it in Orfeo by Richard Powers?
First Wonder: one wonders how it could have been written down on, and then read from, paper - it seems to be the type of music that transcends (or defies) being captured by a written score... Second Wonder: how the piano page turner could stay focused.
@Gowge Bloob - You might compose something awful, too, if you were imprisoned in Zgorzelec in 1941! Did you try listening until 20:15 (5th movement)? That might win you over. Cheers.
IT STANDS ALONE,AS PROBABLY THE MOST AMAZING HISTORIC PIECE EVER WRITTEN,i cannot imagine,dying in a concentration camp,playing for the germans who would kill you,music for god and Christ among monsters,unreal,and live,it creates shivers to the BONE
9 ปีที่แล้ว +8
mark patterson he didn't die in a nazi camp. And it was a POW camp, not a concentration camp.
I NEVER SAID HE DIED IN A CONCENTRATION CAMP!!!, I SAID I CAN'T IMAGINE ""DYING" IN A CONCENTRATION CAMP,OLIVIER SAID HE WAS JUST GIVEN ENOUGH RATIONS TO LIVE!!!,A GERMAN POW CAMP VS. A CONCENTRATION CAMP IS LIKE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HANGING AND BEING GARROTED,CHOKED SLOWLY,GET REAL
Always perplexes me when folks don't understand a piece of music, especially one as acclaimed as this, that they think the shortcoming is with the music and not with themselves!!!
+Elizabeth Brand Absolutely! When I first got into classical music, it was JS Bach and Mozart. Then I discovered Tchaikovsky, and then Vaughan Williams and Shostakovich. Later on, Tippett and Jehan Alain. Then Bartok, Alban Berg and Schoenberg. While I still love the earlier music, the mid 20th century compositions are scarily beautiful, mysterious, urgent, dangerous and so full of an aching freedom that I want more and more! The initial effort of engaging with such music pays enormous dividends.
Chacun des instruments représentant les anges qui se mobiliseront pour cette Bataille Apocalyptique...Si seulement St Jean en personne pouvait diriger ce quatuor, ce serait PARFAIT!!!
The player fills their mouth with air, and whilst forcing it out using their cheeks they breathe inwards through their nose. Relatively easy with most reeded/brass wind instruments as there is plenty of resistance from the reed/mouthpiece.. much harder with flute as there is little or no resistance!
I can't believe Messiaen and the other 3 people managed to perform this piece in the prison camp...how is this possible? that's a 54:33 minute piece :S
Hey, I've heard of circular breathing and I'm guessing it's a method to breathe while keeping air flow through the reed (watching this), but I'm not a wind player, could you explain? Thanks!
Depends on for whom. For a rather avant-garde, atonal piece like this, for untrained ears, it might not make much difference - but that does not mean the untrained ears can't receive the emotional impact from it. A listener can be touch, being a rookie or an expert. For listener that are musicians or not musicians but really know the piece, a wrong note is certainly detectable.
In fact, this is a relevant and interesting question. Not stupid at all. When a modern piece uses less traditional harmonics, it is harder for even trained ears to tell whether a note is wrong or not. Go observe a competition. All judges have a copy of music in front of them and they all flip through the pages, following the music.
"makes a difference" =/= "noticeable as wrong to someone who doesn't know the piece". If, in a piece of Bach, someone plays a CEG chord instead of a CEA chord, this makes a difference. Of course it does--it's a different chord! This is despite the fact that, depending on the context, it might sound 'right' to someone who doesn't know the piece. And it's despite the fact that this one change might make a miniscule difference the piece as a whole. It's no different in atonal music. The notes matter massively. If they were different, the piece would feel--maybe just a tiny bit, but nevertheless--different. To see this, get the score and play it to yourself, then change some of the notes. If it feels different, then the difference matters.
This piece is not atonal, at all -- it is modal. Messiaen quotes many examples from this piece in his 1944 treatise "The Technique of my Musical Language." Most of Messiaen's music is based on his so-called "Modes of Limited Transposition." In fact, once you understand the modal foundations, Messiaen's music is every bit as systematic as any tonal piece by any classical composer of the 18th or 19th century. Bottom line: if you don't like it, just say so, but don't embarrass yourself by making statements out of ignorance. Few contributed more to the theoretical underpinnings of music in the 20th century than Messiaen.
Kiernan Burke So because he dont like this piece as much as other pieces, he is ignorant and unintelligent? Have you ever heard about the fact that people have different taste? I have many composers I prefer over Messiaen, like Poulenc, Debussy and Spohr.
It is an acquired taste. But what it need is not necessary study - it needs our change of taste. Beethoven was shockingly modern at his time. Mozart surprised his peers with innovations. No, Messiaen doesn't need to wait for that long.
A story heard from CBC radio back on March 10, 2013:
"Messiaen composed the quartet in a Nazi prisoner-of-war camp during World War II, after being captured as a French soldier. Fortunately for Messiaen, and for music history, one of the German guards was a music lover, and a kind of unsung hero, too.
His name was Karl-Albert Brüll. He was terribly excited by the fact that a significant composer was in the camp. He supplied Messiaen with compositional tools: pencils, paper, erasers, and he also ensured Messiaen would be given the time and space to work. Brull was apparently kind to other prisoners, too, and he helped facilitate Messiaen’s eventual return to Paris.
The Quartet for the End of Time [...] It’s become Messiaen’s most famous composition. His lasting legacy. Without Brull, this music would never have existed.
Decades later Brull tried to visit Messiaen, knocking at his door in Paris, but Messiaen declined to see him. No one knows why - maybe he didn’t want to be reminded of his time as a prisoner of the Nazis. Perfectly reasonable.
But eventually Messiaen changed his mind - he wanted to reach out to the man who had made it possible for him to write his masterpiece. He wrote him a letter - but it was too late - soon after that unanswered knock, Brull was hit by a car, and he died."
+James Young That sounds somewhat similar to the plot of The Pianist, if you've ever seen it. Maybe based on this man?
Thank you for interesting information
Best regards
+Moonlit Sorrow
The German officer in "The Pianist" was Captain Wilhelm Adalbert Hosenfeld, who died in a Soviet prison camp. Similar story--different person--it might have happened more often than we can ever know.
Mr Pinhedz Thank you for filling in the blanks for me. Yes, unfortunately, it's hard telling how many times such things happened. A shame - he was a remarkable pianist.
How terribly sad that Messiaen couldn't overcome his probable distaste for that decent guard, likely a rarity of a gentleman in that occupation. While understanding his bitterness against the Nazi régime and government, Herr Brüll definitely deserved a much better reception; particularly given how it was he who helped Messiaen have a chance to write this work. May God Grant both men reconciliation in Heaven...
Beautiful piece, even if much of it is jarring to traditionally-inclined ears. Perhaps the last movement is the most haunting of all - it's a paraphrase and transposition (from C-major into E-major) of the second half of his "Diptyque" for organ-solo, which features a harmonic-flute solo against the organ's string-stops.
A Messiaen premiere in a German prisoner of war camp: The modern French composer Olivier Messiaen played the piano part in one of the strangest premiere performances of the 20th century on January 15, 1941. As the composer put it: "My Quartet for the End of Time was conceived and written during my captivity as a prisoner of war and received its world premiere at Stalag 8a in Görlitz, Silesia." One of the four performers was cellist Etienne Pasquier, who offered this recollection: "We were captured at Verdun. Our entire company was initially held in a large field near Nancy. Among our comrades was a clarinetist who had been allowed to keep his clarinet. Messiaen started to write a piece for him while we were still in this field as he was the only person there with an instrument. And so Messiaen wrote a solo piece that was later to become the third movement of the Quartet. The clarinetist practiced in the open field and I acted as his music stand. The piece seemed to him to be too difficult from a technical point of view and he complained about it to Messiaen. "You'll manage,' was Messiaen's only reply." Pasquier reports that the performance was a great success, and led to the release of Messiaen and his three colleagues, as the Germans assumed-wrongly, it turns out-that the four musicians must have all been non-combatants.
It truly captures the sound of an era.
Circular breathing at 14:20!!
Wow, that clarinet solo is unbelievable!!
I came to this through reading Richard Powers' novel "Orfeo". Highly recommended. As well as being an excellent novel in its own right, it has extended sections giving the history behind - and an appreciation of - this and several other classical pieces. Trust me; read it.
A wonderful composition with superb players, especially of movement 5, glowing with heart, soul and skill. An unsurpassable experience.
Desperately beautiful. Words fail me.
Came to this at an odd angle via an Astronomer, expecting music for withered earths and dying suns...it could still be overlaid on those visits, but in it's own contexts gives us the realization that under certain conditions the end of time can be any time, any place and under any crushing conditions both spiritual and temporal
Beautiful rendition of this masterpiece !
Thanks a lot
this piece powerfully reflects the concept of the end of time. The high pitched strings seem to imitate the stretching out of time.
Great work, really one of the more significant pieces of mid-century music.
What is jarring about it, though is Messiaen's abandonment of counterpoint - besides the obvious solo movements, that is. In the first movement, he sets up the idea of parallel cycles. We're expecting something that resembles two (or more) musical lines that are both independent and interactive in some ways. But in the first movement, the parts go on without any interaction. Yet, it holds together. That is one of the reasons why it is so stunning, this "charm of impossibility".
This is an incredible performance!!! Thank you very much for this (:
Amazingly beautiful music.
I find the fifth movement just sublime. Great piece and great performanca.
so beautiful
Clarinetist Richard Nunemaker: "Yes! I was circular breathing. It's what glass blowers do. I breath in through my nose while blowing air out through my mouth. Much fun."
I like how the string players always hit their notes just right. Imagine playing a score like that.
This is absolutely the strangest music that has ever reached my ears. Almost simultaneously confounding and enthralling. Amazing performance.
And just because, anyone reach this because they read about it in Orfeo by Richard Powers?
+James Grant
yes! i was reading orfeo listening the quatuor, and so ... i stopped reading and only listening ! deep and far...
James Grant read the section from Orfeo alongside listening to this. was astounding to see how it was used in the novel
Oddly I'm now considering going in the opposite direction. I've known this piece for years but never been aware of a connection to this novel.
I would laugh if Messiaen planned that there will always be applauses after this masterpiece, and it also has it's meaning in his interpretation :D
A masterpiece and great soloists !
Thanks a lot
Beautiful! Thank you for producing, and sharing here :)
thank u for this! makes me feel so much
The 5th movement was awesome.
I would mop my brow at 17:50 too if I'd just played that, Mr Clarinettist!
Astounding performance.
I love this piece especially the 5th movement . This is music played in Heaven.
MasterPiece! Bravo!
After 1 year still this musik giving us a thinking what way we are going fore a better life????
Nice!
First Wonder: one wonders how it could have been written down on, and then read from, paper - it seems to be the type of music that transcends (or defies) being captured by a written score... Second Wonder: how the piano page turner could stay focused.
@Gowge Bloob - You might compose something awful, too, if you were imprisoned in Zgorzelec in 1941! Did you try listening until 20:15 (5th movement)? That might win you over. Cheers.
IT STANDS ALONE,AS PROBABLY THE MOST AMAZING HISTORIC PIECE EVER WRITTEN,i cannot imagine,dying in a concentration camp,playing for the germans who would kill you,music for god and Christ among monsters,unreal,and live,it creates shivers to the BONE
mark patterson he didn't die in a nazi camp. And it was a POW camp, not a concentration camp.
I NEVER SAID HE DIED IN A CONCENTRATION CAMP!!!, I SAID I CAN'T IMAGINE ""DYING" IN A CONCENTRATION CAMP,OLIVIER SAID HE WAS JUST GIVEN ENOUGH RATIONS TO LIVE!!!,A GERMAN POW CAMP VS. A CONCENTRATION CAMP IS LIKE THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HANGING AND BEING GARROTED,CHOKED SLOWLY,GET REAL
way to overreact, buddy. Get a grip.
mark patterson Learn how to type.
Always perplexes me when folks don't understand a piece of music, especially one as acclaimed as this, that they think the shortcoming is with the music and not with themselves!!!
+Elizabeth Brand
Absolutely! When I first got into classical music, it was JS Bach and Mozart. Then I discovered Tchaikovsky, and then Vaughan Williams and Shostakovich. Later on, Tippett and Jehan Alain. Then Bartok, Alban Berg and Schoenberg. While I still love the earlier music, the mid 20th century compositions are scarily beautiful, mysterious, urgent, dangerous and so full of an aching freedom that I want more and more! The initial effort of engaging with such music pays enormous dividends.
you said it
It's an adventure isn't it? Curiosity drives it and open mindness broadens it.
Great Performance!
Heh mvmt 2 sure gives me a lot of shivers. Feels like the decent into hell or something similar.
Thought i'd give this piece another listen due to recent superstitions. Great performance!
Chacun des instruments représentant les anges qui se mobiliseront pour cette Bataille Apocalyptique...Si seulement St Jean en personne pouvait diriger ce quatuor, ce serait PARFAIT!!!
The player fills their mouth with air, and whilst forcing it out using their cheeks they breathe inwards through their nose. Relatively easy with most reeded/brass wind instruments as there is plenty of resistance from the reed/mouthpiece.. much harder with flute as there is little or no resistance!
I can't believe Messiaen and the other 3 people managed to perform this piece in the prison camp...how is this possible? that's a 54:33 minute piece :S
Thank you.
Mvt 5 is written using serialism. I think this is a nod to German control. The unison expresses the tyrrany of imposed conformity.
Magnificent! Messiaen was the most lyrical of the 20th Century composers.
Daniel Drader, yes. Most opinions are somehow emotionally driven and personal, so debate is essential and always welcome. It's all an education.
Music for Solstice 2012.
I will forward your question to Richard Nunemaker the clarinetist.
Fucking love tritones.
Hey, I've heard of circular breathing and I'm guessing it's a method to breathe while keeping air flow through the reed (watching this), but I'm not a wind player, could you explain? Thanks!
Did somebody say tritones?
@Gowge Bloob: "But each to their own." Certainly, especially concerning (pedantic) TH-cam comments.
What, no drums?
Let me say this for discussion's sake. If any of the notes in any movement would have been different, would it make any difference?
Depends on for whom. For a rather avant-garde, atonal piece like this, for untrained ears, it might not make much difference - but that does not mean the untrained ears can't receive the emotional impact from it. A listener can be touch, being a rookie or an expert. For listener that are musicians or not musicians but really know the piece, a wrong note is certainly detectable.
stupid question.
In fact, this is a relevant and interesting question. Not stupid at all. When a modern piece uses less traditional harmonics, it is harder for even trained ears to tell whether a note is wrong or not. Go observe a competition. All judges have a copy of music in front of them and they all flip through the pages, following the music.
"makes a difference" =/= "noticeable as wrong to someone who doesn't know the piece".
If, in a piece of Bach, someone plays a CEG chord instead of a CEA chord, this makes a difference. Of course it does--it's a different chord! This is despite the fact that, depending on the context, it might sound 'right' to someone who doesn't know the piece. And it's despite the fact that this one change might make a miniscule difference the piece as a whole.
It's no different in atonal music. The notes matter massively. If they were different, the piece would feel--maybe just a tiny bit, but nevertheless--different. To see this, get the score and play it to yourself, then change some of the notes. If it feels different, then the difference matters.
This piece is not atonal, at all -- it is modal. Messiaen quotes many examples from this piece in his 1944 treatise "The Technique of my Musical Language." Most of Messiaen's music is based on his so-called "Modes of Limited Transposition." In fact, once you understand the modal foundations, Messiaen's music is every bit as systematic as any tonal piece by any classical composer of the 18th or 19th century.
Bottom line: if you don't like it, just say so, but don't embarrass yourself by making statements out of ignorance. Few contributed more to the theoretical underpinnings of music in the 20th century than Messiaen.
oh my, parallel 5ths at 15:58!
The best off memory of the holecoast
did somebody say birdsong?
Your time is up.
i want those people to play for me
how can i reach them ?
I wish you'd put the titles in French
Space
By any chance do you know a clarinetist named Larry Sobol?
I like this music. It's not the best thing I've ever heard, though.
Kiernan Burke So because he dont like this piece as much as other pieces, he is ignorant and unintelligent? Have you ever heard about the fact that people have different taste? I have many composers I prefer over Messiaen, like Poulenc, Debussy and Spohr.
Ugh, I can't finish listening to it. It's giving me a headache.
It is an acquired taste. But what it need is not necessary study - it needs our change of taste. Beethoven was shockingly modern at his time. Mozart surprised his peers with innovations. No, Messiaen doesn't need to wait for that long.
Really bad E at the end tho🤣🤣🤣🤣
ちょっと演奏が酷い・・・・
Rythmiquement pas en place du tout !
+Giovanni Smartini
pffffff!!!
porque la que pasa las hojas es negra???
Músicos racistas
I do not like this.
A pity. Hopefully one day you will 'get' it.
The end of the world won't be pleasant either.
Heh yeah I suppose some music isn't meant to be enjoyed.
3:44 Beginning of the Mission Impossible theme. What an awful piece. Great players, wasted here. But each to their own.
If that's not bullshit, the word has no meaning.
This is the worst piece to have ever existed. But Great soloists! They almost made me like it!