Original version

BBC Radio 3 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Third Programme.

BBC Radio 3

Radio 3

Migrated podcast image for: Composer Of The Week

Composer of the Week

Music: Classical

Composer of the Week - Brand

An informative guide to composers' lives and their music.

An informative and accessible guide to composers' lives and their music.

Composer of the Week: Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)

Composer of the Week: Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992): Episode 4: Becoming a Celebrity

Episode 4

Episode 4: Becoming a Celebrity

Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)

Becoming a Celebrity

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992), Becoming a Celebrity

Donald Macleod explores Messiaen's period of fame.

Donald Macleod explores Messiaen's period of fame. With Prelude; Monodie; exspecto ressurrectionem mortuorum; Meditations sur le mystère de la Sainte Trinite (VIII and IX).

Donald Macleod explores Olivier Messiaen's period of fame

Olivier Messiaen was the single most important contributor to the organ repertoire in the twentieth century. He took up learning the organ whilst he was a student in Paris, and was fortunate to hear virtuoso organists around the city including Louis Vierne, Charles Tournemire, Charles-Marie Widor and Marcel Dupré. Aged just twenty-two, he succeeded Charles Quef as titular organist at the Sainte-Trinité in Paris. Messiaen remained in this post for over sixty years, composing many solo works for the organ that pushed the instrument to its very limits. He rose to become one of the leading composers in France, and also a worldwide musical celebrity. This week Donald Macleod focuses each day on one specific organ work Messiaen composed, whilst exploring the period in which it was written along with those other instrumental works from the same time.

By the 1960s Olivier Messiaen had married his second wife, the pianist Yvonne Loriod. The couple were invited to tour Japan in 1962, where he was enthralled by the landscape and the birds whose songs he recorded. Messiaen was also amazed by the enthusiastic reception they received in Japan, where they were treated like celebrities and constantly filmed. He had now risen to a figure of national and international importance, and soon came a commission from André Malraux, the Minister of Culture under General de Gaulle. For this commission Messiaen composed his orchestral work Et exspecto ressurrectionem mortuorum, which was a memorial to the French dead of the two world wars. He was still very active as an organist at the Sainte-Trinité in Paris, and a few years later in 1969 Messiaen completed his Meditation on the mystery of the Holy Trinity for organ.

Préludes pour piano
Håkon Austbø, piano

Monodie
Gillian Weir, organ

Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum
Cleveland Orchestra
Pierre Boulez, conductor

Méditations sur le mystère de la Sainte Trinité (Meditation VIII & IX)
Olivier Messiaen, organ

Producer Luke Whitlock.

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Donald Macleod explores the organ music of Olivier Messiaen

Donald Macleod explores the organ music of Olivier Messiaen, who was regarded as the 20th century's most important contributor to the repertoire of that instrument

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Composer of the Week

Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992)

Episode 4: Becoming a Celebrity

Genres

Brand

Series

BBC Radio 3

About BBC Radio 3