ABSTRACT
Olivier Messiaen travelled to New York to hear Mehta conduct Turangalila on 7 January 1988, and to discuss specific details of the commission with the orchestra's management. A detailed examination of the work's genesis reveals the return of Messiaen's creative fluency against a backdrop of declining health and a near-disastrous comedy of errors from the New York Philharmonic regarding financial matters. If 'Dechirures' would have caused problems of meaning, Messiaen's eventual title poses problems for English speakers as 'Eclairs' is one of the words, like 'Regards', which stand in resolute defiance of adequate translation. The work also exhibits a freshness and vitality that, with the possible exception of Un Sourire, had been lacking in the composer's music since Saint Francois. The title of Eclairs suggests that the work consists of a series of individual moments or glimpses, each of which is essentially a self-contained unit; lightning never strikes the same place twice.
