Messiaen's Chord and Harmonic Theory

Alexandre Abdoulaev

Chords: Table of Contents

Underlying Chord Theory

Although the theoretical and harmonic principles found in Olivier Messiaen's compositions are frequently perceived as unorthodox and adventurous by contemporary critics and scholars, the composer himself has expressed a profound love for the works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, remarking that “one would search in vain for an error in his music.”1 Messiaen's music does make use of some diatonic harmonic relationships, but their nature of their implementation is markedly different from that of Eighteenth Century composers such as Mozart. Messiaen weakened (or, in certain cases, altogether annuled) the formal function of diatonic relationships through their use within the framework of his “modes of limited transposition.”2

Thus, the harmonic tendency for tension and resolution normally extant in common-practice harmony exists rarely, if at all, shifting the focus from resolving harmonic tension to prolonging it. This technique supplements Messiaen's tendency to annul the perception of the passage of time through the negation of pulse and meter in his music, and further allows for larger constructs in large-scale forms (as can be seen in Le banquet céleste.) This lack of resolution is one of the underlying principles behind Messiaen's harmonic language.

Messiaen's approach to harmony is intrinsically connected with modes of limited transposition and synaesthesia, as he frequently assigned “colors” to chords, describing the effect as resembling that of a stained glass window.3 In his Téchnique de mon langage musical, Messiaen also addressed his use of the “chord on the dominant,” containing all the notes of the major scale, as well as its intended resolution:4

Musical Example 15

In addition, Messiaen placed a substantial amount of importance on the “color” of the chord, comparing it to the “effect of a stained-glass window.”6 The principle behind this “colorization” rests in the addition of chromatic tones to the scale, and inverting the chords to achieve a common bass note for both the chord and its intended resolution:

Musical Example 2

According to Messiaen, these chords can, similarly, be restructured to consist predominantly of augmented and perfect fourths.7

Musical Example 3

Chords of Resonance

In his Téchnique de mon langage musical, Messiaen also referred to the chords of resonance, or his perception of the upper partials of an acoustic note. This is done in contrast to “inferior resonance,” a term which Messiaen conceived as a contrast to the resonance of the upper partials of a sounding note.8 Messiaen stated that:

If I play very loudly a low C on the piano, after a few seconds I will hear, successively and very distinctly layered, the first sounds that are called the “natural resonance of sounding objects.” If I possess a normal ear, I will hear another C, higher than the first (at the octave,) then a G (the fifth). If I have a sharp ear, I hear beyond that an E (the third); finally, a very musical ear hears B-flat and D (the seventh and the ninth). Personally, I hear additionally an F# (augmented fourth), quite strongly, and an A-flat (minor sixth), very weak. Then come a multitude of higher harmonics, inaudible to the unaided ear, but of which we may get some idea when we hear the complex resonance of a tamtam or a great cathedral bell.9

Thus, the chord of resonance, to Messiaen, was inherently connected to his mode 3, lacking only one note from that mode. The chord of superior resonance will thus contain all of the notes of the overtone series, while a chord of contracted superior resonance will present the same notes in a restacked fashion, much like a cluster. The chord of contracted resonance, in a similar fashion, contains the notes placed in clusters, but with parts of the overtone series missing.

Musical Example 4

Messiaen further remarked on the effect of resonance and chords of resonance in his Téchnique de mon langage musical, referring to them as “effects of pure fantasy, similar by a very distant analogy to the phenomenon of natural resonance.”10 Whether or not this comment was meant as Messiaen's criticism of the practicality of chords of resonance is unclear, but such sonorities can be seen and heard frequently in his works, particularly in Quatuor pour le fin de temps.11 The notion of clustered chords similarly factors into the aspect of Messiaen's treatment of harmony, as the chord of resonance can be broken into segments (or clusters) of notes, consisting primarily of a series of descending fourths and sevenths, thus encompassing the entirety of the overtone series.

Connected Chords

In his writings regarding “Natural Harmony,” Messiaen stipulated that all his harmonic pursuits stem predominantly from natural harmony: “true, unique, voluptuously pretty by essence, willed by melody, issued from it, pre-existent in it, having always been enclosed in it, awaiting manifestation.”12 This, however, presupposes familiarity on the reader's part with the modes of limited transposition and what Messiaen called the “upbeat-accent-termination.” Messiaen illustrated several examples, among them the notion of a harmonic litanies, or melodic fragments of several repeated notes imposed upon a substructure of varying harmonizations.13 Perfect, augmented, and diminished intervals such as fourths and fifths also figure very prominently into the idea of connected chords, as multiple segments (notably from Vocalise, pour l'ange qui annonce la fin du Temps) are structured on a progressive descending series of parallel augmented and diminished fourths. Finally, Messiaen emphasized the importance of placing a theme in any voice: high, middle, or low.14

Other Styles

Despite the originality of Messiaen's approach to chord structure and utilization within the framework of his harmonic education, a lingering influence of the harmonies of Debussy and Ravel is nevertheless present in his compositions. Messiaen addressed the use of polytonality in his contemporaries' works by examining chord structures found in Ravel and Milhaud, focusing particularly on the relationships between diatonic chords and the new tonalities engendered through their various combinations.

Bibliography

Endnotes

  1. Olivier Messiaen, Traité de rhythme, de couleur, et d'ornithologie, v. IV. Paris: Leduc 1997, 129. [Trans. Author]
  2. Paul Griffiths, “Messiaen, Olivier,” Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (accessed 27 March 2008) <http://www.grovemusic.com>
  3. Olivier Messiaen, The Technique of My Musical Language. Paris: Leduc 1956, 50.
  4. Ibid.
  5. All score samples borrowed from The Technique of My Musical Language. Paris: Leduc, 1956.
  6. Ibid.
  7. Ibid.
  8. Anthony Pople. Messiaen, Quatuor pour la fin de temps. New York: Cambridge University Press 1998, 33.
  9. Olivier Messiaen, Conférence de Notre-Dame [delivered at Notre-Dame de Paris on December 4th, 1977] Paris: Leduc 1960, 8-9.
  10. Messiaen, The Technique of my Musical Language. Paris: Leduc 1956, 51.
  11. Pople, Messiaen, 33.
  12. Messiaen, The Technique of my Musical Language, 52.
  13. Ibid, 53.
  14. Ibid, 54.