London Symphony Orchestra
Archive :: production:T127282276, concert:S01383491099, venue:V371
Current :: venue:V371

Turangalila
Messiaen’s Turangalila-Symphonie (1948) weaves an awe-inspiring tapestry of exotic sound. He said that it celebrates ‘love, joy, time, movement, rhythm, life and death,’ and was inspired by the intensely romantic myth of Tristan and Isolde. Messiaen hoped to create both a ‘love song’ and a ‘hymn to joy.’ In Dutilleux’s vibrant Metaboles (1965), each movement deftly introduces the next - according to the composer, ‘you could compare it with the way tiles overlap on a roof.’