ABSTRACT
Among the fine arts, music has always been considered a privileged medium when it comes to expressing philosophical or religious ideas. Many composers have developed individual kinds of music, albeit intuitively, that aim at expressing higher truths. The twentieth-century composer, Olivier Messiaen, explicitly created his music with this aim. With Le banquet celeste, intended for performance during communion, Messiaen wanted to intensify the atmosphere of silent contemplation he associated with communion. His strategy for doing this, in this piece as elsewhere, was to extract characteristics from the religious content that were general enough to allow for a musical translation. Le banquet céleste can be segmented into three parts, each containing an exposition of the main theme. The challenge for Messiaen in Le banquet céleste was to create a kind of music that in its stillness and stasis created the appropriate atmosphere to accompany what for Catholics is the high point of Eucharist: the silent contemplation of Christ during communion.
