Messiaen: Méditations sur le mystère de la Sainte Trinité, I/49

Olivier Messiaen’s Méditations sur le Mystère de la Sainte Trinité grew out of improvisations that he performed at the inauguration of the rebuilt organ of La Trinité in 1967. It became his largest cycle to date and marks Messiaen’s first use of ‘communicable language’, in which each letter of the alphabet is assigned a unique pitch and note-value, thereby translating text into music. Haunting harmonies, awe-inspiring monumental grandeur and the deepest profundity of expression are contrasted by the innocence of birdsong with the recurrent call of the yellowhammer, a tranquil voice from nature amid kaleidoscopic Biblical themes.