Olivier Messiaen, Quatuor pour la fin du temps (Quartet for the end of time; 1941)

Here is a recording of the seventh movement from Messiaen's quartet. The film was commissioned by the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center and was conceived and directed by Tristan Cook.



The seventh movement is subtitled "Fouillis d'arcs-en-ciel, pour l'Ange qui annonce la fin du temps" ("Cluster of rainbows for the angel who announces the end of time"). Messiaen writes about the movement:

Certain passages from the second movement return. The mighty Angel appears, and above all the rainbow which crowns him (the rainbow: a symbol of peace, wisdom and of all sounding and luminous vibrations). In my dreams, I hear recognised chords and melodies, I see known colours and forms; then, after this transitory stage, I pass beyond reality and submit in ecstasy to a dizziness, a gyratory interlocking of superhuman sounds and colours. These swords of fire, these flows of blue-orange lava, these sudden stars; this is the tumult of rainbows! (from the preface to the score; trans. Anthony Pople)

Questions:

1. What instruments do you hear? Why do you think Messiaen chose this unusual grouping?
   
2. How would you describe the overall form of this movement?
   
3. Perhaps more so than any other composer in the twentieth century, Messiaen has his own idiosyncratic musical language. How would you describe his melodies? Harmonies?
   
4. "The end of time" can be interpreted in a variety of ways. How might ideas of "the end of time" relate to this piece (think not only in terms of the biblical references but also in terms of musical time)?
   
5. Messiaen had a condition known as synaesthesia: he saw colors when he heard sounds. Are there relationships that you detect between the music and the colors? Consider the film as well as Messiaen's description.
   
6. This work was mostly composed while Messiaen was a prisoner in a concentration camp during WWII. Despite the fact that basic human needs were scarcely being met, art was still being created. What does this tell us about the role of art in our lives?
   

Additional resources:

• The second video (eighth movement):
  
  
  
  
• A neat website about the Quartet from Lawrence University
  
• A January 2011 article from the Wall Street Journal about the piece.
  
• An essay by Alex Ross from the New Yorker about the work.