Release Date: 01/01/07

The twenty Contemplations of Vingt regards fall upon the newborn Son of God lying in the manger. They range from the ine

The twenty Contemplations of Vingt regards fall upon the newborn Son of God lying in the manger. They range from the inexpressible contemplation of God the Father to the Church of Love, through the spirit of joy impossible to express in words and the infinite tenderness of the Adoration of the Virgin to the Angels, the Magi, and the immaterial or symbolic Time, Silence, the Star and the Cross. The shifting perspectives revolve round the infant Jesus like the celestial bodies the sun, at different distancesand speeds and in different dimensions. Christ is revealed at their centre in all His manifoldness, but never fading beneath the eyes cast upon him. Running throughout the work are four cyclic themes conceived of by Messiaen as aspects and acting aspointers - such 'aspects' of a human being may, according to him, be the way he looks, walks and dresses. The four aspects are the Theme of God, the Theme of Mystical Love, the Theme of the Star and the Cross, and the Chord Theme. The movements proceed more according to their musical charactel; tempo, intensity and colour than in any chronological or symbolic order. EvelY fifth movement addresses the subject of the Divinity: in the fifth as the Son, in the tenth as the Joyful Spirit, in the fifteenth as the visible manifestation of the invisible God, and in the last movement as a vision of the Church that is the extension of the body of Christ.