an account of the technical and interpretative challenges presented to performers in Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time.
Olivier Messiaen (1908-1992) played a significant part in the evolution of twentieth-century music, influencing a number of other composers with his innovative compositional techniques. The Quartet for the End of Time, is not one of Messiaen’s typical works due to the circumstances in which it was composed (his main outputs were organ, orchestral and choral works), but it marks the start of the significant use of some of these techniques.
In 1940, Messiaen was called up to serve in the army as a hospital orderly, but was soon captured by the Germans and taken to a prisoner-of-war camp. Here, suffering from food deprivation and extreme cold, he had the idea of composing a piece for the End of Time. There were four musicians on the camp – himself (a pianist), a violinist, a cellist and a clarinettist – and so he wrote a quartet. Performers of the work need to consider the circumstances under which the piece was composed and also the reaction it created at the first performance of it. This was in front of the entire prison camp in January 1941 where, says Messiaen, ‘never have I been listened to with such attention and understanding.’
Messiaen had no choice on what instruments the piece was written for, ‘the group of instruments…to large to allow the piano to express itself freely, yet too small to obtain…variety of timbre,’ and his way around this was to obtain ‘maximum variety of which they are capable.’ By exploiting each instrument in so many different ways to create different timbres, the technical challenges faced by the performers are endless. Musicians need to be of an excellent standard to achieve, for example:
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a) String harmonics, see Quote 1
b) Long, sustained pp passages in the string parts, see Quote 2
c) Piano: quiet passages must still be projected as chords are creating a necessary background colour, see Quote 3
I will also be looking into how Messiaen uses extremes of dynamics and range for timbre and textural effects and the challenges these presents.
Interpretative challenges presented by theological ideas behind the Quatuor
The Quatuor is based on Revelation 10.1-7, in particular the phrase “there shall be no more time.” Time is represented musically in different ways throughout the Quatuor and the addition of this theological basis to the piece ‘may well have been prompted by the prisoner-of-war conditions in which he found himself, in which time might indeed have seemed literally endless, and the Apocalypse close at hand’ .
It is difficult to know, though, to what extent this theological basis must be considered and portrayed when performing the Quartet for the End of Time. The words that it is based on appear in the title and preface, but the challenge to the performer is deciding to what extent the text should be interpreted as a narrative or programme. Similar challenges are presented by Romantic music; if a composer does not provide an explicit programme e.g. Berlioz’ Symphonie Fantastique it is up to the performer to interpret whether one was meant and to what extent it should be portrayed in a performance.
The deciding factor in the case of the Quatuor is to consider movements 5 and 8, taken directly from Messiaen’s earlier works Fêtes des belles eaux (1937: Organ) and Diptique (1930: 6 ondes martinots) respectively. There were no theological implications in these works, although Messiaen may have just chosen to keep these hidden. However, the performer may draw the conclusion that he has re-worked these particular pieces because of their link to the idea of abolishment of musical time and interpret from the following quotations what he may:
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‘I did not in any sense want to comment upon the Apocalypse. My only wish was to articulate my desire for the dissolution of time.’ Messiaen
‘Do not be preoccupied with all this [descriptive analysis] when you perform; simply play the score, the notes and the exact values, the marked nuances.’ Messiaen
The true challenge presented to the performers concerning the theological background of the composition, though, is the way in which it reflects the idea of the “end of time” and illusions of heaven, although not in a programmatic sense as discussed. When, playing in the ensemble it is easy to become mesmerised by the hypnotic repetition (isorhythm in movement 1), colour chords (piano part), slow speeds (movements 3, 5 and 8 particularly), and sustained notes (e.g. cello part in movement 5).
Once rehearsals in the ensemble and unmitigated practice of the separate parts have been completed the most difficult challenge of all is to be faced; concentration. This is not so much of a technical challenge but is linked to interpretation. Messiaen has created an evocative and reflective piece of music and each member of the ensemble is part of it at all times if it is to be perceived in this way by the audience.
Technical challenges created by the 5 musical means of expression
Messiaen builds his theological meanings into the Quartet for the End of Time, through “five principal means of musical expression”:
i) modes
ii) expanded pedals
iii) added values
iv) progressive enlargement and contraction of intervals
v) the chord on the dominant
He talks about these in his Technique de mon language musical (1944).
I will be looking at added values and other rhythmical features, and the chord on the dominant, as a means of abolishment of traditional musical conceptions. These provide technical challenges to a performer used to playing most music written before the turn of the twentieth-century.
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Messiaen disliked artificial rhythm i.e. symmetrical, divisible note values common of Western tonal music. He found ways of creating more natural rhythms. One of these was the idea of added values (or additive rhythm – taken from the principle of the deçi-tâlas of Sharngadeva )– where the addition to a rhythm makes its value irregular. I spoke before the influence of Messiaen’s music on the music of composers since. Additive rhythm was an important innovation in twentieth-century music and has been used by composers such as Stravinsky in his disreputable Rite of Spring. For common examples of how a rhythmic cell is made irregular see Example 4. For examples of added values in the context of the work Quartet for the End of Time see Quotes 5, 6 and 7, where they are indicated by brackets.
For a performer to find these rhythms relatively simple they need to be familiar with them. The musicians at the prisoner-of-war camp in 1941 would have found added values a particular challenge as they had not come across the music of Messiaen before and so inexperienced with irregular rhythms and lack of pulse and time signature. Aware of this, Messiaen composed movement 4, Intermede, first, for the three musicians as an exercise in octaves to introduce them to some of his compositional techniques. Although his characteristic rhythmic complexities were generally avoided there are very few added values. Performers today are more experienced with such rhythmic complexities (as I have already mentioned, they have continued to have been used in twentieth-century music), and are used to having to count rhythms in terms of smaller note values i.e. semiquavers, when practising.
Messiaen also used polyrhythmic stuctures and rhythmic pedals and they form the basis to the cello and piano parts in movement 1 of the Quatuor, Liturgie de Crystal. The separation of pitches and rhythms is a noteworthy feature of the music and was to form an important idea in the development of some styles of twentieth-century composition. If a rhythmic pattern does not reoccur with the same pitch pattern as before, the piece technically becomes difficult to play. In movement 1 the separation of pitch and rhythm appears like so:
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Cello: repeated 15 note melody consisting of 5 pitches repeated three times. These pitch repetitions are obscured by the fact that each time a different rhythm appears on the 5 notes.
Piano: cycle of 29 chords over a rhythmic sequence of 17 note-values. The moment of resolution of the piano’s rhythmic and harmonic pedals is never heard because of his use of prime numbers.
The definition of a rhythmic pedal is “an independent rhythm which constantly repeats itself, without paying any heed to the rhythms which surround it” (Technique de mon language musical).
In movement 1 of the Quatuor, the two independent rhythmic pedals are combined with two independent birdsongs (clarinet and violin) creating a movement which is extremely challenging to play as an ensemble as a whole. Messiaen’s preface to this movement gives us a picture of the eternal truths of heaven (endless repetition in cello and piano) versus the natural world (symbolised by birdsong).
Due to the separation of the sound worlds, when playing the piece it is difficult for the performers to know if all the members of the ensemble are in the same place. It is a challenge to know when to ignore and when to rely upon the other parts and remain in that frame of mind. Neither pedals are related to the birdsong in the other parts, and non of the rhythms in any of the parts correspond to the time signature (this movement is one of the only movements with a traditional time signature) which gives no rhythmic guidance and the pulse is a challenge to grasp.
A closer look at Abîme des oiseaux, and the technical difficulties it presents
The technique of combining two different sound worlds and also the incorporation of birdsong, can be related to movement 3 of the Quatuor, Abîme des oiseaux. Here the two separate ideas of the ‘abyss of time, its sadness and its weariness’ and birdsong, ‘the opposite of time; they are our desire for light, for the stars and for the things of heaven’ – Messiaen, taken from a translation of the preface, need to be portrayed by only the clarinet. It is quite challenging for the clarinettist in to switch between these two different sound worlds so often and difficult to always be in the right frame of mind at the right time. For example, the ‘sadness’ and ‘weariness’ that Messiaen suggests, can be seen in the music from the Lent section at the beginning to the end of held F sharp at which point the characteristic of the music immediately transforms into the idea of birdsong, see Quote 8. I know from playing this movement alone that a great deal of concentration is needed to be able to switch between styles rapidly in this manner, and this is not the only point in the Quatuor to do this.
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Messiaen liked rhythms that were not artificial, as I have already mentioned and this is a reason why he liked birdsong so much. Messiaen believed that ‘the birds are probably the greatest musicians to inhabit our planet,’ birdsong being the natural element of this work as a whole. He could include added values into these sections, and the challenge presented to the performer here is to play the rhythm strictly as Messiaen has written it, yet still make it sound natural and free.
Although Messiaen had little choice in his use of instruments, he orchestrates well and the clarinet is the ideal instrument for playing something with as great a range and with such flexibility as birdsong. The shrill sound that can be achieved on the clarinet is a lot similar to the sound of actual birdsong. However, the versatility of the clarinet is exploited at great lengths, and the full range of the clarinet is explored in short spaces of time, see Quote 9 and also Quote 10, a different section in the piece which also incorporates every register of the clarinet in just one breath. It is particularly difficult in such cases for a clarinettist to adjust his ambruchure (mouth shape) so quickly so that each note, from the chamuleau register to the highest register, is of the same quality. This also requires a great deal of breath support, a particular challenge after playing such a slow passage with extremely long phrases.
Quote 9 also demonstrates Messiaen’s use of the ‘chord on the dominant,’ another idea developed by Messiaen and explained in his Technique de mon language musical, which he often associated with birdsong. The Quatuor was the first of his works to incorporate birdsong in this way. Many followed, most significantly Oiseaux exotiques (1956), Catalogue d’Oiseaux (1958) and Chronochromie (1960).
In each case the ‘chord of the dominant,’ is associated with a certain bird. The chord is swift moving and spread, as Quote 9 shows. Each time it occurs in the score a challenge is presented to any instrumentalist (linked to colour chords), as the succession of notes will not fall naturally beneath the fingers of a classically trained performer, as, for example, a rip upwards of a major or chromatic scale (or a diatonic chord) would.
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Other technical challenges due to range of dynamics, pitch and articulation – related to timbre and compositional circumstances
I have already mentioned extremes of register and amount of breath support required by the clarinettist in movement 3 of the Quatuor. Also note that the control needed when performing the extremes of register at pp, see Example 10, is phenomenal. This challenge of control is present throughout the whole of the Quartet for the End of Time in every part. I will conclude this essay by presenting to you and commenting on specific areas which demonstrate this. These final examples are important as they can be linked to issues concerning compositional circumstances i.e. Messiaen used such extremes to create different timbres and also to how Messiaen used compositional techniques to portray the theological aspects behind the music (i.e. reasons for presenting such challenging music to performers),
Quote 11: demonstrates the need to control the sound when there is a sudden change in articulation.
Quote 12: demonstrates the need to be in control of the instrument when faced with an unusual and challenging technique – ‘col legno’ is to use the wooden side of the bow on the cello strings which is particularly difficult for control of intonation.
Quote 13: demonstrates the need to be in control of intonation within the ensemble. This is the case in all sections of the Quatuor scored for two or more parts in octaves.
Bibliography
ed. Hill, Peter, “The Messiaen Companion” chapter entitled “The End of Time: a Biblical Theme in Messiaen’s Quatuor ,” (London: Faber and Faber 1995)
Johnson, Robert Sherlaw, “Messiaen,” chapters entitled “Birdsong,” “Christianity and Symbolism” and “The Works of the War Years: Quatuor pour la Fin du Temps (1940-41),”
