Celebrate Trinity Sunday with Olivier Messiaen

Hendrick van Balen, Holy Trinity, Sint-Jacobkerk, Antwerp, 1620s


Celebrate Trinity Sunday with Olivier Messiaen

Olivier Messiaen, Méditations sur le mystère de Sainte-Trinité / Meditations on the Mystery of the Holy Trinity.

 

1) Le Père Inengendré: The Father Unengendered ("The Father of the Stars")

2) La Sainteté de Jésus Christ: The Holiness of Jesus Christ

3) La relation réelle en Dieu est réellement identique à l’essence: The True Relation to God is Actually Identical to the Essence

4) Je suis, Je suis !: I Am, I Am!

5) Dieu est immense, Éternel, Immuable. Le souffle de l’Esprit – Dieu est Amour: God is Immense, Eternal, Immovable - The Breath of the Spirit - God is Love

6) Le Fils, Verbe et Lumière: The Son, Word and Light

7) Le Père et le Fils aiment par le Saint-Esprit eux mêmes et nous: The Father and the Son Love, Through the Holy Spirit, Themselves and Us

8) Dieu est simple: God is simple

9)  Je suis Celui qui suis: I Am Who I Am

Click here to go to a performance by Charles Thompson at the 1927 E.M. Skinner & 1963 Aeolian-Skinner organs of the Cathedral of Saint Paul in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Performance of Thomas Daniel Schlee at the Cavaillé-Coll organ of l'Église de la Sainte-Trinité, Paris [musicMe] (info)

Performance of Christopher Bowers-Broadbent [musicMe] (info)

Performance by Olivier Latry on the Cavaillé-Coll organ of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame, Paris. [YouTube]

Performance of Michael Bonaventure at the Rieger organ of St. Giles' Cathedral, Edinburgh [We7] (info)

Click to go to Simon Cummings' blog where it is possible to download Olivier Messiaen himself performing the Méditations on the Cavaillé-Coll organ of l'Église de la Sainte-Trinité. 

Olivier Messiaen, who was titular of the Cavaillé-Coll organ of l'Eglise de la Sainte-Trinité in Paris for 66 years, composed other organ music in praise of the Blessed Trinity as well.

The Pièce en trio, No. 1, from the Livre d'orgue, was composed for Trinity Sunday. Listen: Messiaen himself, Thiry, Bonaventure.

As was the Pièce en trio, No. 2, also from the Livre d'orgue.
Listen: Messiaen himself, Thiry, Bonaventure.

And the last movement of Le Corps glorieux / The Glorified Body: La Mystère de la Sainte-Trinité / The Mystery of the Blessed Trinity. Listen: Messiaen himself, Byram-Wigfield, Trotter.