Messiaen - Regard VI

[ozzy]

Par Lui tout a été fait

Well... without question the most difficult piece to learn of the twenty. Unfortunately the position after regard IV and V makes it even more difficult to perform. A truly astonishing piece once mastered though..... which is why I keep practising! 
But....  I play the piece far from perfect (but then again, who does??) but I think itīs definetely far from a catastrophy anyway. This is a OK live-version! IMO anyway.
Many hours work behind this one.....

[rob47]

Fantastic!

you don't happen to be steven osbourne>>? (ozzy)

[quantum]

Fantastic!

you don't happen to be steven osbourne>>? (ozzy)

Now that you mention it, I've had the Osbourne recording for a while now (and absolutely love it) and the similarity with your user name just didn't click. So is there any slight chance that you are the same person?

[ozzy]

Wow.... Havenīt been online here for several months (yes.. well... Im sorry!  Iīm a bad person and I know it... ) and the first thing I see when I return is that I am being taken for Steven Osbourne...
My comment to this is simply one big "I WISH!!"   

(My real name is Oskar, therefore "ozzy".)

I am getting  a real ego boost here... jeez.. but I ofcourse would like to thankyouverymuch for these kind words. Steven Osbourne is a truly great artist in my book, and as you know his recording is one of the very best! Amazing abilities. Wow...
Well now... After shamelessly sucking in all these speculations  Iīm now even more motivated to post the remaining ten regards (thats why I logged on today in the first place.) and I sincerely want to apologize to those of you that have thought of me as a man not keeping his words. Starting tomorrow(I promise), or maybe tonight,  you will find the Regard XI-XX here in the audition room, to go with the ten already posted.
Heck...itīs only four months late...

[ozzy]

Heck...itīs only four months late...

Ehhh...or like...eeh..seven... 

[jre58591]

man, this sounds exactly like stephen osbourne's interpretation. this is so awesome. its one of the better performances ive heard of the piece. also, how could you do all 20? how long did it take to learn them all? sorry if im a bit ecstatic. you probably broke an audition room record! it has a few sloppy parts in it, but you seem to have a good grasp over the piece.

[ozzy]

man, this sounds exactly like stephen osbourne's interpretation. this is so awesome. its one of the better performances ive heard of the piece. also, how could you do all 20? how long did it take to learn them all? sorry if im a bit ecstatic. you probably broke an audition room record! it has a few sloppy parts in it, but you seem to have a good grasp over the piece.

At this point I must point out the curious fact that although I have like seven-eight complete cycles on CD , I have not yet bought Osbournes recording.... I have heard many many good things about it from various reliable sources, so I will definetely buy/listen to it someday in the future. And now that people say my playing sounds a bit like his, Iīm gettin even more curious about it of course...
Itīs not that big of a surprise though that one can find similaritites in the tradition of the interpretation . From what Iīve heard about Osbournes recording it seemed like Yvonne Loriod was quite a lot involved, and was a big admirer of Stevensīplay. And when I studied this piece (well   ... I keep studying... when I first tried to learn this piece) I worked a lot with Håkon Austbö, one of of Loriodīs foremost students, and winner of the Messiaen competition in the seventies (I think he won it somewhere between Beroff and Aimard).

it has a few sloppy parts in it,

Iīll be the first one to admit this. Unlike probably Aimard or Osbourne itīs possible that I never in my lifetime will produce a totally solid live recording of this piece, especially when playing by heart.
I do, as mentioned, still feel this particular one is not completely out of line.
Apart from the memorizing and the technical quite nasty things, one of the major obstacles (which one can not underestimate)  in playing this piece is the position after five more or less calm Regards before this one. You really need a good deal of concentration before you hit that first d sharp, and still you very ofte find yourself like hit by a bus or something after the first page...
I think, but Iīm not totally sure , I have made one or two performances that could go as better ones, but then again I think that those were at occasions when I played this piece as a single solo piece. At a few competitions etc. And thatīs another thing, like...