Sub question 1: What role does the chorale play in Messiaen’s orchestral and ensemble repertoire and what are Messiaen's views on the chorale, homorhythmic writing, harmony and voice leading?
1.1 The chorale in the music of Messiaen
The two chorales of La Transfiguration are entirely homorhythmic,8 which draws the attention of the listener forcefully towards the melody and harmony. Messiaen named the movements VII and XIV in La Transfiguration ‘Chorale’. How are these chorales related to the ‘traditional’ chorales as used by, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach?
The term ‘Chorale’ is defined in the New Grove9 as “The congregational hymn of the German Protestant church service (...) following a German practice common in the 17th and 18th centuries, the term often refers to simple harmonisations of the German hymn tune, as in ‘Bach chorales’ or ‘four-part chorales’ ”. The chorale is most relevantly part of the vocal repertoire of J.S. Bach and is an example of homophony. In some Bach chorales, passages are homorhythmic, however, an entire homorhythmic chorale is difficult to find. What are other characteristics of a chorale?
Essentially, we could think of the chorale as a vocal four-part harmonisation of an (mostly existing, sometimes plain chant) hymn, with religious text, solemn character, and using homophony. Since the hymn can be a modal10 or tonal melody, the harmonisations of those melodies are mostly modal or tonal too. Messiaen composed the melodies11 for the two chorales in La Transfiguration in a style which is neither modal nor tonal, and subsequently his harmonisations reflect this: this is in contrast with the traditional chorales. Robert Johnson, a British composer and pianist, comments that the chorales in La Transfiguration are ‘in the style of a chorale, not an actual Lutheran chorale’.12 However, it is unclear what, in Johnson’s view, the characteristics of a chorale actually are.
Table 1.1 shows the use of the chorale in the orchestral and ensemble repertoire13 of Messiaen. The dates of composition make clear that the chorale is part of compositions throughout his entire oeuvre.
Comparing the chorales and their use in Messiaen’s compositions, some remarks could be made:
- all chorales are in a slow tempo (M.M. 36-76) which creates a solemn character
- the chorales are homophonic and mostly homorhythmic
- some chorales are named ‘Choral’ by Messiaen
- the harmonies change usually once per beat or with a change of note in the melody14
- the chorale is used by Messiaen through his whole oeuvre: L’Ascension is one of the first published compositions for orchestra15 – Éclairs sur l’Au-Delà... is the last completed work
- some chorales are the last parts of movements/compositions
- some chorales are accompanied by another rhythmic layer or layers16
- Messiaen uses a plain chant melody in only one chorale: the chorale in Couleurs de la Cité Céleste
- each chorale is mostly written with a single dynamic marking
- the chorales are mostly performed with tutti orchestra/ensemble
1.2 Messiaen on homorhythm, harmony and voice leading
Homorhythm
In his writings Messiaen does not mention the use of ‘homorhythm’ (in which all voices move in the same rhythm); the term ‘homophony’ (melody in the upper part with accompaniment in the others) is also absent. Are these textures not important to Messiaen? George Benjamin, British composer and former pupil of Messiaen, writes in Messiaen as Teacher:17
“However, many harmonic concepts – background motion, tension and above all, polyphony – were foreign to his thought (…).”
It is difficult to imagine that Messiaen didn't talk about writing techniques as homophony and polyphony during his harmony, analysis and composition classes at the Paris Conservatoire.18 Since Messiaen didn’t mention homophony and polyphony in his writings, could it be that these concepts are so clear and obvious to Messiaen that he feels no need to address them? Or, according to the preface of Technique de mon langage Musical,19 does Messiaen expect his readers to be experienced musicians?20
“Si le lecteur est nanti de solides études d’harmonie, contrepoint et fugue, composition, orchestration, sans oublier la rythmique et l’acoustique, il me suivra beaucoup plus facilement.”21
Harmony
In his texts about harmony, Messiaen mentions only chords and modes. Chapter XIII of Technique entitled ‘Harmonie, Debussy, notes ajoutées’, is about added notes (sixte ajoutée and quarte augmentée ajoutée) and demonstrates examples of these chords drawn from his own oeuvre. Not a single word appears about harmony: the word ‘harmony’ is not even present in this chapter! What is harmony to Messiaen? Is 'harmony' simply synonymous with 'chords' for Messiaen? He only talks about the types of chords he uses and does not relate these chords to a harmonic context at all.
The title of Chapter XIV in Technique is ‘accords spéciaux, grappes d’accords et liste d’enchaînements d’accords’.22 After examples of his accords spéciaux,23 a short paragraph on harmonie naturelle follows as an introduction to the liste d’enchaînements d’accords. Messiaen says the following about this list: 24
“Nous allons maintenant dresser une liste d’enchaînements d’accords. Aux Chapitres suivants, nous essaierons encore d’agrandir notre horizon harmonique, par l’usage des « modes à transpositions limitées « (…). Toutes ces recherches ne doivent pas nous faire oublier l’harmonie naturelle : la vraie, l’unique, la voluptueusement jolie par essence, la voulue par la mélodie, issue d’elle, préexistante en elle, depuis toujours enclose en elle, attendant manifestation. – Mon secret désir de somptuosité féerique dans l’harmonie m’a poussé vers ces épées de feu, ces brusques étoiles, ces coulées de laves bleu-orange (…). Un tel bouillonnement doit nécessairement être philtré : c’est l’instinct sacré de l’harmonie naturelle et veritable qui, seul, s’en peut charger.”25
The true (or natural) harmony is ‘willed by the melody’ and ‘enclosed in it’: this could suggest that there is only one possible harmonisation of a melody: the ‘true’ one. It’s difficult to imagine what a ‘true’ harmonisation for Messiaen might be due to his idiosyncratic harmonic language. Example 1.2 shows Messiaen’s harmonisation of a (transposed) plain chant, used in Couleurs de la Cité Céleste. Example 1.1 is the start of the original plain chant. Apparently, this is the ‘true’ harmony to Messiaen. What could we say about this harmonisation? Some remarks:
- in mm. 2-4 and 12 (2nd beat)-13, the harmonisation of the melody notes a1, b1 and c♯2 is strict: each note has his own chord
- in mm. 5-12, the choice of chords with repeating notes in the melody is varied: the e2 in the melody is harmonised four times with different chords
- the setting changes from 4 up to 8 notes per chord; in the orchestration some instruments double the voices of the choir whereas some play separate parts or have rests
When Messiaen follows his harmony classes at the Conservatoire with Jean and Noël Gallon,26 it is likely that Traité d’harmonie by Théodore Dubois was used.27 However, his earliest harmony education was with Jean de Gibon: in those private lessons, Messiaen worked with the method by Dubois, but also with one by Henri Reber28. At first glance, these harmony treatises look quite traditional. From that perspective, we could imagine a young Messiaen harmonising the Alleluia melody used in Couleurs de la Cité Celeste in a more traditional way, without the use of his modes or accords spéciaux. The first three notes of the melody a1, b1, c♯2 and the e2 could be harmonised tonally in A major, with functional chords as shown in Example 1.3. Comparing these options with Messiaen’s harmonisation, only the E major chord in root position as a harmonisation of the e2 is the same.
The liste d’enchaînements d’accords in Technique has several categories, enriched by 71 examples of chord progressions from Messiaen’s own work. He never speaks about the connection between chords or explains a progression of chords; he does however mention modes, accords spéciaux, tonality, pedal notes and types of motion between voices.29 There is no detailed explanation accompanying most of these 71 examples and the reason for choosing exactly those examples is unclear. Does Messiaen only want to show examples of the connections between chords? Is there no need to give further explanation? Is this the ‘charm of possibilities’ ?30 Maybe Messiaen doesn’t want to explain or reveal too much, or indeed maybe he doesn’t know how to explain because of his “intuitive musicianship” as mentioned by theorist and musicologist Allen Forte.31
Voice leading
Messiaen does not use the term ‘voice leading’ in Technique at all; in Traité de rythme, de couleur et d’ornithologie and other writings it is also absent. However, in Technique Messiaen uses aspects of voice leading to describe successions of chords in his chapter about modes: he uses the terms ‘succession parallèle d’accords’ and ‘mouvement contraire’ without further explanation.32 An example of a ‘parallel succession of chords’ can be seen in Example 1.4. In Technique and Traité, Messiaen shows a succession of parallel chords in all modes. An example of ‘contrary motion’ is showed in Example 1.5.
As with parallel motion, no further explanation of this technique is given. Messiaen mentions neither the contrary motion between the layers of the texture in example 318, nor the use of parallel motion within the two different layers. In some of these 71 examples, there is a full major or minor triad per layer, but this is also left unexplained. Other types of motion such as oblique or similar motion are not described in Messiaen’s writings at all.
Theorist and pianist Christopher Neidhöfer discusses the contrapuntal techniques mentioned in Messiaen’s writings, such as contrary motion, parallel motion and canon.33 Later, he writes about Messiaen’s counterpoint, including the way Messiaen uses the term ‘counterpoint’ in his writings: Neidhöfer concludes this is pretty ‘straightforward’ and ‘in line with the traditional uses of the term’.34 Messiaen himself doesn’t write very clearly about voice leading; however, he does write about the importance of melody in Technique:35 “Primaut à la melodie”.36
Conclusion
It is difficult to answer the sub question for this chapter, especially the issue of Messiaen’s view and ideas on the topics addressed in the question. It seems that Messiaen is explaining what is important to him, such as his approach to rhythms, bird-songs, modes and, above all, his concept of son-couleur. Of course, we should not expect a composer to explain all aspects of his own music, but since Messiaen wrote extensively on his compositional process, as well as working as a teacher for many years, we might expect some clarification on topics such as harmony and voice leading.
However, the terms ‘chorale’, ‘homorhythmic writing’, ‘harmony’, ‘homophony’, ‘polyphony’ and ‘voice leading’ are absent in Messiaen’s own writings and interviews or, if present, they are poorly explained or used in a more general way. The term ‘harmony’ is mentioned, but the result is a list of examples of chords and chord progressions with no further explanation. No horizontal aspects are explained by Messiaen. Does he construct harmony only from a vertical perspective? It seems likely that his connections between chords are guided by modes, accords spéciaux and, perhaps more importantly, colour and changes of colour. Could one conclude: harmony is only colour to Messiaen?