Concert Review: This is Your Brain on Ecstasy

Esa-Pekka Salonen leads the Turangalîla-symphonie.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Hear the hair: Esa-Pekka Salonen conducted the Turangalîla-Ssmphonie
at David Geffen Hall this week. Photo by Chris Lee © 2014 The New York Philharmonic.

Since its premiere in 1949, Olivier Messiaen's Turangalîla-symphonie has stood alone. Consisting of ten enormous orchestral movements and spanning nearly an hour and a half, this piece that strikes terror into the hearts of conductors and concert-goers. In the wrong hands, this mega-symphony can be a lumbering beast, a composer's ego out of exploding in a flurry of orchestrated bird-song and strange chromatic ideas that can (literally) send patrons running for the nearest exits.

Concert Review: A Voice in the Crowd

Pianist Eric Huebner gives a Messiaen Week recital.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Image by commonmarket for zazzle.ca

If you were to list the great concert pianists on the classical scene today, you'd probably miss Eric Huebner. That's because Mr. Huebner is the current holder of the piano chair with the New York Philharmonic. He spends most of his  time providing 88-key support in major orchestral works and occasionally playing chamber music with other orchestra members. On Wednesday night, the Philharmonic's current Messiaen Week festival offered Mr. Huebner a chance at the solo spotlight with a recital all to his own.

Concert Review: Messiaen-ic Visions

The Philharmonic makes CONTACT! to open Messiaen Week.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Taxi! A still from Esa-Pekka Salonen's commercial for Apple's iPad Air.
Image © 2015 Apple Inc.

This week, the New York Philharmonic begins a week-long celebration of the life and work of Olivier Messiaen, the French composer who combined mysticism and modernism in equal measure to become one of the most important, if occasionally mystifying composers of the 20th century. Billed as Messiaen Week, the series opened Monday night with a CONTACT! concert of chamber music: solos and duets by Messiaen, his pupils and composers that he influenced over a long career.lassical,