SANTA BARBARA -- The title of Olivier Messiaen's "Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant-Jesus" does not translate easily into English. A common version is "Twenty Gazes Upon the Child Jesus." But "regards" also implies "aspects" or "contemplations." One translator, apparently feeling that any suggestion of corporeality would be misleading, simply supplied ellipses for "regards." After all, Messiaen's mystical music invites out-of-body experiences.
That was certainly the effect of Christopher Taylor's spellbinding performance of the work Wednesday night in a new, intimate space at the Music Academy of the West. The evening began when an apparently mild-mannered pianist -- balding, conservatively dressed in tan jacket and dark pants -- walked onstage in Hahn Hall looking like a professor about to begin a lecture. (Taylor is, in fact, on the faculty of the University of Wisconsin, Madison.) But after two hours at the keyboard, he had become a wild man in the thrall of a great vision, seemingly possessed of superhuman powers. Clearly forces beyond the normal were at play.
First, though, a quick word about the hall. Hahn, which opened last month, is the new centerpiece of the West Coast's elite summer music academy, hidden away in a plush neighborhood of Montecito, a block from a glorious coastline. The interior design is on the busy side, but with 350 seats, it is perfect for chamber music and recitals. Acoustics are unobtrusive; nothing gets between music and the ear. Besides serving as a home for students, faculty and visiting artists at the academy's summer festival, Hahn will also become available in the fall for local chamber groups and UC Santa Barbara concerts.
But fine as Hahn is, Taylor all but made the hall disappear. Messiaen's "regards" are the gazes (or whatever) of a devout Roman Catholic composer at different aspects of his church. He has a theme of slightly shifting, ever shimmering chords for God and a sinuous chromatic melody for what he calls "Theme of the Star and Cross." He turns his attention to the Virgin, the Father and the Son, but also to silence and the sword, to time and creation, and most of all to love.
Written in Paris between March and September 1944, "Vingt Regards" is extraordinary music of extraordinary times, during which the Allies invaded France (D-day was that June), and Messiaen's score is not only a profound contemplation of existence but also a huge outpouring of gratitude. He was also newly in love.
