Messiaen @ 100: An Organ Concert with Mark Steinbach, Saturday, November 22, 8:00 p.m., Sayles Hall

Mark Steinbach, Brown University Organist, is nationally known as an expert in twentieth century and contemporary works for the organ. On Saturday, November 22, at 8:00 p.m., in Brown's Sayles Hall, he will perform a concert celebrating the 100th birthday of pioneering French composer Olivier Messiaen. Steinbach's program will include a very rare opportunity to hear Messiaen's  L'Ascension in its entirety, as well as Apparition de l'église éternelle, and excerpts from La nativité du Seigneur, and Les corps glorieux. Steinbach will perform on the historic Sayles Hall 1903 Hutchings-Votey organ.

The concert is free and open to the public.

Messiaen is considered one of the most important and influential composers of the twentieth century and the centennial of his birth is being celebrated around the world. He composed for orchestra, piano, voice, opera, and his own instrument, the organ, and was most widely known for his haunting chamber music work Quartet for the End of Time, written in 1940 while he was incarcerated as a prisoner of war. Messiaen passed away in 1992 at the age of 83.

Messiaen felt that music had a strong visual aspect and claimed to have actually possessed synesthesia—the ability to "hear" colors. "When I hear music, I hear colors," he said, "not through my eyes but through my intellect. When I compose, I see the colors as I see the sounds." Messiaen expanded the impressionistic idea of musical colors set forth by Claude Debussy, whom he revered, and formed his own harmonic language based on "modes of limited transposition." He was also greatly interested in the music of Asia and Africa as well as intricate Indian ragas, Greek rhythms, song patterns of birds, and electronic music. Some of his students rank amongst the most significant composers of the last century, including Pierre Boulez, Iannis Xenakis, George Benjamin, Gyorgy Kurtag, and electronica guru Karlheinz Stockhausen. 

Of this concert, Steinbach noted that "the works I've chosen for this concert represent all of the key attributes of Messiaen's music, encompassing his interest in world music, Catholicism, additive rhythms, improvisation, and humanism, and birdsong. No matter what music you love to listen to, from Bach to jazz to progressive rock, you will find Messiaen fascinating,"

L'Ascension [The Ascension], described by Messiaen as "four meditations for orchestra," was composed in 1933. In 1934 he transcribed three of these movements for solo organ and wrote a completely new movement, Transports de joie.  A technical tour de force, Transports de joie is often performed as an individual piece, but Steinbach will perform it in context of the entire suite. A complete performance of L'Ascension is about 27 minutes. Also on the program is the spellbinding Apparition, which was featured recently in Paul Festa's acclaimed 2006 documentary film Apparition of the Eternal Church. The films includes commentary by literary critic Harold Bloom, filmmaker John Cameron Mitchell, Scissor Sister's singer Ana Matronic, and legendary harpsichordist Albert Fuller. 

Steinbach previously performed L'Ascension at St. Thomas Church, New York City, The National Shrine, The National Cathedral in Washington D.C., and St. Paul's Cathedral, Buffalo. His performance of Transports de joie from
L'Ascension is featured on the 2007 CD release Pipes Rhode Island, an anthology documenting important organs in Rhode Island. 

A strong advocate of new music for the organ, Steinbach regularly programs works by Philip Glass, György Ligeti, Anton Heiller, and Messiaen. He has performed the world premiere of several of Daniel Pinkham's compositions, including Odes at the Regional Convention of The American Guild of Organists and Music in the Manger at the National Convention of the Association of Teachers of Singing.

Steinbach has been featured on National Public Radio's "All Things Considered," playing the oldest church organ in the United States (1640s, St. Paul's, Wickford, RI). Additionally, he has performed for the National Convention of The Organ Historical Society and the American Guild of Organists Regional Convention. He accepted recent invitations to perform at the Bolzano and Piemonte organ festivals in Italy as well as The International Organ Festival of The Netherlands in Amsterdam. Steinbach, who holds joint appointments in Brown's Music Department and the Office of the Chaplains and Religious Life, earned the Master of Music and Doctor of Musical Arts degrees from The Eastman School of Music. As a Fulbright Scholar he studied at the Hochschule für Musik in Vienna.  Steinbach serves as curator of University Organs and teaches as lecturer in music at Brown. He is also director of music and liturgy at historic St. Paul's Church, Wickford.

This concert is sponsored by Brown's Music Department and the Office of the Chaplains and Religious Life.

The concert is free and open to the public.