Author: sherman
Date: 2006-06-01 14:48
Very recently there was a reference to a poem concerning this work. The entry got no responses, so I decided to check out the poem and found it to be unfortunate and incorrect.
This pice is the most striking work of the previous century iwhich includes our clarinet. It was composed under the most trying circumstances, the composer being interned in a Concentration Camp while composing and also playing the first performance...for the 5,000 inmates of the Camp.
Bad instruments, playin in a used Czech Army uniform, yet, " I felt I was the only person in the entire audience", so said Olivier Messiaen, the composer, a spiritual composer basing an incredible number of works including clarinet upon bird calls.
Few will attempt the work because it features unusual difficulties and at 48 minutes is long for a single work on a program and perhaps too short for the only work on a program.
I have played it a dozen times, several with players who played it with Messiaen , and incidentally will be playing it again at Festival Alexandria in Canada on July 2nd.
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The Clarinet BBoard
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