Turangalila
In 1949, Leonard Bernstein conducted the premiere of a piece of music for the Boston Symphony Orchestra. The piece was the Turangalîla-Symphonie by French composer Olivier Messiaen. It was composed for a large orchestra and included a rather primitive electronic instrument called the ondes martenot.
In 2016, the Amazon Prime show Mozart in the Jungle featured the fictional New York Symphony playing Turangalîla-Symphonie for prisoners at Rikers Island, New York City’s main jail. The episode is called “Not Yet Titled.” The title refers to a documentary that is being filmed by Bradford Sharp (played by Jason Schwartzman). This conceit permits them to insert interview segments with inmates as well as a brief section in which the ondes martenot is explained.
Astonishingly, to make this episode, they actually put on a concert at Rikers. So the interviews with inmates that are interspersed in this episode were basically real. The music for this episode was almost all by Messiaen, including Quatuor pour la fin du temps (which Messiaen wrote when he was a prisoner in Stalag VIII-A at the beginning of World War II), Vingt regards sur l'enfant-Jésus and Turangalîla-Symphonie. Messiaen was a modernist composer. He didn’t compose 12-tone music, but he studied it and used alternative forms of tonality. His work can be challenging. One would imagine an orchestra trip to play for prisoners would feature a familiar warhorse. But I like the idea that the New York Symphony decides not to condescend to the inmates by playing something unchallenging.
Although the ondes martenot has a keyboard, it’s closer to a theremin than a modern electronic keyboard. And the way Messiaen used it was to make these sci-fi movie sounds on top of the orchestra.
Jason Schwartzman wrote this episode along with Alex Timbers and director Roman Coppola. This show was weirdly enough a Coppola family project. In fact, Anton Coppola guest stars on one episode. Anton Coppola was the uncle of Francis Ford Coppola. Roman Coppola is the son of Francis Ford. Jason Schwartzman is the son of Talia Shire, sister of Francis Ford. The Coppolas are a very intriguing family, with multiple generations of artistic achievement.
As for the music itself, like much 20th century avant garde music, it feels a little jittery and nervous in parts. But it also has the sections with vast, rolling chords, reminding me of La Mer by Claude Debussy. But you can listen for yourself in this performance.
That is Gustavo Dudamel conducting the Orquesta Sinfónica Simón Bolívar de Venezuela with Yuja Wang playing the piano. The conductor in Mozart in the Jungle, Rodrigo de Sousa (played by Gael García Bernal) is said to be based on Dudamel, although I find it hard to imagine Dudamel being as eccentric as the de Sousa is in the series.
Mozart in the Jungle was a very enjoyable series, especially if you are interested in classical music. But without realizing it, they somewhat cluelessly managed to make a pro-sexual harassment series. The main character, a very beautiful young oboe player Hailey Routledge (played by Lola Kirke), is trying to make it as a classical musician in New York. She auditions for the New York Symphony, and almost immediately conductor Rodrigo de Souza starts planting unasked-for kisses on her. This continues until she finally sleeps with him. (And it is only one example of the sexual harassment that the Hailey Routledge character endures.) It’s was made recently enough that Schwartzman and Coppola should have known better.
Before I ever listened to Turangalîla-Symphonie or even knew that it was a piece of music, I was a fan of the character Turanga Leela on Futurama. I am staggered that they chose to name a main character of their network comedy after an obscure piece of French modern classical music.
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