It was a prisoner-of-war camp (he was a captured French soldier), and he
died in 1992 (Messiaen, Copland, Bernstein -- bad year for composers).
There's more to the story, too.
When his unit was captured, he was carrying a pillowcase full of papers.
When the Germans tried to take it from him he fought for it so hard that
the Germans had to beat him into unconsciousness to get it from him.
Thinking they had captured some important dispatches or other items of
intelligence value, they dumped the pillowcase onto a table, and out
fell scores by Mozart, Beethoven, Bach ...
I'm not a historian, so I won't offer any opinion as to the
truth/factfullness of the story, but it is a great story about one of my
favorite composers.
date: Thu, 22 Mar 2007 09:53:36 -0400
from: David Goldberg <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
subject: Re: [Hornlist] Bernhard Heiden
Inspired by Mara's original question, I wondered if the French composer
Olivier Messiaen is Jewish. Messiaen was interned in a Nazi
concentration camp in 1940 and while there, he composed a quartet for
the four instruments that were available to him, these being a piano,
violin, clarinet, and a cello with only three strings. You could say
that this quartet is painful and deep. The quartet was performed in the
camp for the inmates and prison guards. What a moment that must have
been. In any case Messiaen, still living I think, is Christian, and was
captured as a French soldier. For what it is worth, that's all
interesting in the story of this very unlikely case of a composition, at
least.
_______________________________________________
post: horn@music.memphis.edu
unsubscribe or set options at
http://music2.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
