MUSI 8120 – “Post-Tonal” – Adrian Childs

Final project – May 02, 2016

Lourenço De Nardin Budó

The Quartet for the End of Time is one of the most acclaimed works from the

twentieth century and perhaps the most famous by the French composer Olivier

Messiaen. Plenty of religious connotation, this work is a reference to the chapter X of

Saint John’s Apocalypse, as the composer himself writes in his preface. Messiaen also

quotes the part of the book in which an angel plenty of force comes from heaven and

announces that there shall be no more time.1 This quartet is the result of meticulous

work in which Messiaen used from several innovative compositional resources. This

paper brings an analytical overview of some of these applied in the sixth movement,

“Danse de la Fureur, pour les sept trompettes.” The movement is in unison and again,

as the composer himself says, the most rhythmically characteristic of the movements.

This study will focus on some aspects of the rhythm and referential collections, as well

as the consequences of their manipulation and relationship. This helps to define

thematic and transitional ideas, types of variations, and ambiguity issues.

1
Free translation of Messiaens words. Olivier Messiaen, Quatour pour la Fin du Temps. (Paris:
Durand, 1942), I-II.
 RHYTHMIC MANIPULATION

As part of the symbolism inherent to this piece (the end of time), the lack of

regular metric, use of non-retrogradable rhythms, and manipulation of rhythmic values

are constant in the sixth movement. The procedures of augmentation/diminution and

addition/subtraction of values are common and create very characteristic sounds. For

instance, the added sixteen-note appears frequently composing different motivic cells,

with their variants. It usually happens by the addition of the value of a single sixteenth-

note within a line of eighth-notes, whether by actually adding a sixteenth-note, or by

adding a dot to an eighth-note. Among those cells, a recurring one is the figure of

eighth-note/sixteenth-note/eighth-note, i. e. a 2:1:2 pattern (figure1).

Figure 1
From m. 1

By itself, this is a non-retrogradable rhythm and, also, the isolated sixteenth-note

works to destabilize the feeling of a regular pulse. It appears in the most varied sections

within different collections:

M. 10 M. 13

Within transitional passage, surrounded by sixteenth notes: mm. 23-24.

Within a larger palindromic pattern: m 29.

It occurs also in proportionally augmented forms, mm. 55-58 (observe that the

rhythms in each measure follow the proportion 2:1:2).

Mm. 55-58 (note: m. 57 presents the original cell three times):

The addition by the dot also appears, usually at the end of phrases:

M. 4

Another important feature of Messiaen’s rhythmic treatment is the extreme

(mostly rhythmic) variation applied to the themes. A common subject of those

variations is the material from the opening eleven measures. They form an expository

idea, which can be divided in subgroups, such as:

- a mm. 1-2, and mm. 7-8;

- b mm. 3-4;

- c mm. 5-6;

- c’ mm. 9-11.

A very similar statement occurs in mm. 14-24 (with modifications in c’). Theme

b also repeats isolated at the end of the first large section of the piece (m. 45-47).

However, the rest of the piece never brings those themes unaltered. In mm. 48-50, a and

b come back compressed in a passage with almost only sixtheenth-notes:

 A comparison between the first statement of a and b (mm. 1-4), and its variation

in mm. 48-50 (Table 2).

Table 2
Mm. 1-4

Mm. 48-50

The same running-note variation is applied again to b (m. 54), a and c (mm. 59-

61), and c’ (m. 68-70). In mm. 71-76, a is more interestingly manipulated, with

occurrences of the original rhythmic patterns, as if the theme struggled to come back to

its primary and not rushed form. At the end of m. 76, it results in an augmentation of the

2:1:2 rhythm:

Table 3
Mm. 71-76 – compare to those previous appearances shown in table 2.

An even more striking variation comes at mm. 93-101, when a and b appear not

only with a completely irregular augmentation of rhythm, but also with their notes

dislocated in pitch space. In this part, adjacent notes can be separated by extremely large

leaps; nonetheless, the 2:1:2 rhythm is still present (figure 4).

Figure 4
Example from the piano part from mm. 93-96.

REFERENTIAL COLLECTIONS

As the topic of different sections comes up, it is important to discuss what define

those other than in terms of rhythmic or motivic manipulation. The movement presents

sections that contrast much in terms of referential collections. More specifically, there

are parts with consistent use of whole-tone and octatonic collections, parts with extreme

chromaticism or fragmentation of collections, and parts in diatonic collections.

Already mentioned, the opening measures present three thematic subgroups.

They show consistent2 use of the collections, namely:

- a mm. 1-2, and mm. 7-8 – WT0;

- b mm. 3-4 – WT0;

- c mm. 5-6 (and c’ in mm. 9-103) – OCT0.

Since the variations of those themes work by keeping the pitches and only

changing rhythm or replacing them in pitch space, variations of a, b, and c always fit in

those same collections as in their original appearance. However, what follows in mm.

2
For that purpose, it is important to mention that the B♮ in a and b is always considered
either a neighbor or passing tone.
3
In the previous paragraphs, c’ is described as within mm. 9-11, however, in m. 11 the use of
OCT0 becomes completely inconsistent. This issue and the ambiguity of defining thematic ideas or
transitions shall be discussed next.
11-13 consist in a much more unstable section. Connecting with the octatonic c theme,

fragments of octatonic collections are found, but not necessarily from OCT0. In fact, m.

11 starts with a fragment of that collection, which is once transposed by T8, resulting in

a subset of OCT1. Table 5 illustrates it:

Table 5

Beginning of m. M. 11: Starting with M. 11 (continued): subset of OCT1.

10 the same three pitch The first four pitches form a T4 of the
classes as m. 10, form previous [0147]; including the other
a subset of OCT0 as pitch classes (11 and 4), it still creates
well – [0147]. a subset of OCT1.

The sequence is interrupted by hints of diatonicism, but before the end of m. 11,

again, octatonic fragments motivically related to m. 10 appear. They are expressed

below including their prime forms:

Table 6
X [01469] Y [0134] z [0347]

Fragments from m. 10.

Table 7
x’ [01347] y’ [0147] z’ [0236]

Respectively related fragments in m. 11.

Fragments x, y, and z, as part of the theme c, compose OCT0. Although x’, y’,

and x’ also are subsets of octatonic collections, they are all from different ones,

respectively OCT1, OCT2, and OCT0. Nonetheless, relationships between them can be

made:
 - Motives y and y’ have most similarity in shape, y’ being a more “expanded”

version of y;

- z and z’, other than being subsets of the same collection, share three common

tones;

- x and x’ seem more diverse, but they have significant intervallic relationship, I.

e. their interval vectors show the same amount of interval classes (IC) 2, 3, 4, and 6 –

respectively <113221> and <213211>.

Such as y’, the first fragments of m. 11, shown in the previous table 1, have also

the same prime form [0147]. Motive y’ relates to the first fragment of m. 11 by T5.

Without question, comparing with the previous statement of themes a, b, and c, in m. 11

the feeling of stability decreases, suggesting the start of a transition. However, since all

these relations are possible, an argument for m. 11 being just an expansion of the c’

theme can be made. Also, m. 11 ends in a half-note C, like any other closing of theme c,

and it both starts and ends with OCT0. Agreeing with this argument, there is the already

mentioned varied repetition of c’ starting in mm. 68, which includes a passage

corresponding exactly to that one in m. 11 (mm.69-70) without interruption between

them.

As previously stated, hints of diatonicism interpolate the octatonic fragments in

m. 11. Between the materials from m. 11 shown in tables 6 and 7 is the following

passage (table 8), segmented in two parts (the last F also composes the previous motive

x’):

Table 8 – M. 11
v [0257] DIA -4
 M. 12 shows a rather stable DIA +6 shortly interpolated with another [0257] and

a [0358] from different collections.4 In m. 13, however, the instability comes back again

with the prominence of descending ICs 1. Along with a diminuendo, this section leads

to the slight varied restatement of the opening eleven measures (mm. 14-24) starting

now in piano (figure 9).

Figure 9
M. 13

Considering the ambiguous m. 11 as a still thematic material, part of c’, it is

reasonable to refer to the stable m. 12 as a new contrasting theme and only m. 13 as an

actual transition.

Ambiguity regarding the theme c comes again at the end of the restatement of

mm. 1-11. A scheme of mm. 14-24 follows:

- a mm. 14-15, and mm. 20-21 – WT0;

- b mm. 16-17 – WT0;

- c mm. 18-19 – OCT0;

- c’’ mm. 22-24) – OCT0 and OCT1.

Figure 10
M. 24, the continuation of c’’ interpolating OCT1 (blue), and OCT0 (green)

4
Those diatonic occurrences might be a foreshadowing of a contrasting larger section at mm.
26-39, which will be studied later.
 When compared to c’, this passage does not look as instable, making it easier to

interpret as an expansion of c’’. It also shows consistency in the matter of expanding

variants of c and, therefore, contributes to the previous argument of m. 11 being an part

of c’.

The following measure, 25, definitely consists in a transition. After a descending

arpeggio composed by two small sets (prime forms [0257] and [02497]) arriving in an

E, a sequential ascending line starts, together with the marking Pressez un peu. The

passage can be segmented in smaller gestures according with the changes in the bass,

which ascends as E-F♯-G-A♭-B♮-B♯-C♯-D-E♭-E♮-F. Figure 11 illustrates the

segmentation:

Figure 11

M. 25. Different colors represent different prime forms. Each segment is labeled
according to its bass note:
F♯ [036]
G [0137]
A♭ [036] (could be also interpreted as only IC4, without the B♮, which elides with the
next segment)
B♮ [026] – potential subset of [0137] and [0126]
B♯ [0126]
C♯ [0126]
D [0125]
E♭ - E♮ - F grouped forming a chromatic ascent [012]

It is interesting to observe how each segment relate to another: the A♭ set is a T5

of F♯; B♮ is almost an I6 of G (if there was no D♮ in it); C♯ is a T1 of B♯; and D almost

again a T1 of C♯ (if there were a G♯ instead of B♭). There is no need, however, to

recompose Messiaen’s music and find an accurate mathematical relationship to get the

feeling of intervals compacting. IC’s1 are becoming prevalent with the appearance of
[0126], [0125] and the T1. Ultimately, the bass notes E♭, E♮, and F literally state that

intention with the added feature of rhythmic augmentation (although in contradiction to

the tempo marking).

IC1 and rhythmic augmentation are similar features from those in the transition

of m. 13. This one in m. 25, however, differ much by tempo and dynamic. Also, m. 13

does not bring the music to an actually new section, while m. 25 is followed by a very

contrasting material, a fourteen-measure section in which Messiaen abuses of

palindromic rhythms.

RHYTHMIC SET AND “PITCH VARIATION”

In the beginning of this study, the rhythmic manipulation in this movement of

the quartet was discussed, including the use of non-retrogradable (or palindromic)

rhythms. Although it seems visually organized in the score, the palindromic rhythm

patterns, added to the very soft dynamic, give an even less regular and more ethereal

character to the piece. Also, differently from the previous music, this part is not founded

in octatonic or whole tone collections, but can rather be described in the context of

diatonic collections.

In terms of pitches, the composition of mm. 26-39 can be simply described as a

repetition of the same sixteen-note row: D A F♯ C♯ G♯ A♯ C♯ D♯ B F♯ C G E F A B♭.

This row repeats through the fourteen measures seven times, traveling by different and

very organized palindromic rhythmic patterns. The patterns change each measure

varying in both duration and number of attacks. A set of seven different patterns repeats

once, thus filling the whole section. The rhythm, however, does not line up exactly with

the row in a way that the row would restart at the beginning of a measure. In other
words, one can say that fixed rows of rhythm and pitch are phasing. A diagram of the

rhythmic patterns by measure including the number of beats and attacks per measure is

shown below:

Table 12

Measure 26/33 27/34 28/35 29/36 30/37 31/38 32/39

Beats 24 21 19 19 13 13 13
Attacks 5 5 7 11 9 9 11

We can conclude, for instance, that the first repetition of the sixteen-note row

starts on the last attack of m. 27; the second, in the fifth attack of m. 30; and so on.

The first three measures produce an interesting segmentation to the row,

dividing it in three sets, each one composing an almost complete5 different diatonic

collection:

- {D, A, F♯, C♯, G♯} – DIA+3;

- {A♯, C♯, D♯, B, F} – DIA+6;

- {C, G, E, F, A, B♭} – DIA-1.6

As an attempt to label more specifically each collection, one can use the longer

note in each measure (which is also the central note of the measure) as tonic. The result

is respectively F♯ Aeolian, D♯ Aeolian, and F Ionian, however, this or any other

interpretation will hardly give a hint of any clear tonal implication.

An interesting feature of Messiaen’s method here is how pitches might be an

element of variation for rhythm. As opposed to those variation procedures previously

described in which same sets of pitches reappear in different rhythms, in the present

section we have a set of rhythmic patterns that repeats with different pitches.

5
Although they are incomplete, due their configuration, each set cannot possibly be part of a
collection other than those mentioned.
6
A note D is also part of this measure and fits in the DIA-1; however, the row ends with the B♭,
thus, the D is the beginning of the first repetition of the row.
 Some of the interesting results are:

- M. 33 (beginning of the restatement of the set of rhythmic patterns): much

different from its first diatonic appearance in m. 26, here the pattern results in a prime

form of [01237], beginning with a very prominent IC6.

- M. 31 curiously repeats literally in m. 37, although, according to the order of

the set, the corresponding repetition of m. 31 is actually m. 38, while m. 37 corresponds

to 30 (see table 12). This is possible because they are the same rhythmic pattern;

- The bigger the number of attacks in a measure, bigger the chromaticism in it

(since more different pitches of the row will be in it). The last measure, 39, conveniently

results in a very chromatic collection (it only lacks pitch-classes 1 and 8), and it directly

leads to an even more instable section, mm. 40-44.

The few excerpts studied here from the sixth movement of The Quartet for the

End of Time show Messiaen’s mastery in manipulating rhythm and pitches. Consistency

and inconsistency of either rhythm patterns or referential collections result in varied

developments and in a large range of characters and moods, even though the piece is in

unison.