It’s quite an early work and – again – Messiaen is Messiaen; he has a sound, and there are two or three pieces of his that are particular favourites. ‘Le Banquet Celeste’ is a fairly short one, and a fairly simple one that’s very representative of his style. It refers to the celestial banquet, which is the Holy Communion – when you eat Christ’s flesh and drink his blood – and the dripping of the blood is somehow represented by rhythmic repetitions in the bass notes.
That seems to be one thing uniting this list – a kind of theme of “distinctness”.
Exactly. And Messiaen basically invented a language that didn’t exist before – his way of working with harmony was totally revolutionary.
