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The character of the Concert Hall’s organ About the Concert Hall’s organ on the Mariinsky Media website
An internationally acclaimed composer, organist and master of improvisation, Frenchman Thierry Escaich (1965) is one of the present day’s most outstanding musicians. His friendship with Olivier Messiaen played an extremely important role in his development as a musician. Messiaen, having listened to the young musician, bid him an artistic farewell with the words “work as an organist, work as an improviser, and, again, work as a composer.” “Messiaen told me that his masses were a synthesis of his improvisations. He would write down whatever came into his head during a church service. On the other hand, he found it easy to move from the organ – a space of manuals – to orchestral space,” Thierry Escaich has remarked. Escaich mainly composes for the organ (solo compositions, chamber music and concerti including the two La Barque solaire concerti for organ and orchestra), but he is open to all genres and forms, and is continuously investigating the realm of sound. His style can be seen clearly in such works as Choral’s Dream (2003) for piano and organ, Scènes de bal for string quartet and in larger-scale orchestral compositions – Chaconne (2000), Vertiges de la croix (2004), Les Nuits hallucinées for mezzo-soprano and orchestra (2004) and the oratorio Le Dernier Évangilefor double chorus, organ and orchestra (1999). He also recently completed a violin concerto which is dedicated to David Grimal, and he is currently writing a clarinet concerto for Paul Meyer and a ballet for New York City Ballet. Love of cinema has brought Thierry Escaich to compose music for silent films. In 1999 he received a commission from the Louvre to compose the musical accompaniment for Frank Borzage’s film L’Heure suprême.
Anna Kolenkova
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