" A giant fresco, a kind of odyssey," is how Bertrand Chamayou describes the piano masterpiece by Olivier Messiaen, Vingt Regards sur L'Enfant-Jésus. Written in 1944, it is a monumental, mystical, and iridescent sequence of 20 looks or contemplations on the child Jesus. Messiaen once wrote that "the drama of my life is that I have written religious music for an audience that has no faith." For Bertrand Chamayou, the Vingt Regards "are a more mystical than religious experience... It evokes the same kind of wonder as entering a magnificent cathedral or witnessing a beautiful sunset. You feel that time stands still." Chamayou first performed the work in 2008, the year of Messiaen's centenary, but it has been part of his life since he was nine years old. "It was a revelation... I think I can say that the Vingt Regards have played a role in shaping my way of playing, the sound I produce, and my approach as an interpreter." To complement this two-hour landmark of the repertoire, Chamayou has also recorded five short musical tributes to Messiaen, written in the years following his death in 1992. They are by Toru Takemitsu, Tristan Murail, György Kurtág, Jonathan Harvey, and Anthony Cheung.
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