Almost mystical experience

Pianistically, "Vingt Regards" is one of the literature's great challenges. As with the other few who dare tackle it (Peter Serkin and Pierre-Laurent Aimard are among the most notable), Taylor has a massive technique. He is a percussive pianist able to get his Steinway to sound as though it were made of metal, as though it could ring like large bells and generate a rainbow of color.

Rhythm is one of his strong points. Often he was tense as a tiger ready to pounce. But in quiet passages, he lost himself in sound, hunched over the keys as if using psychic powers to will a note to resonate longer than physically possible.

Another trick Taylor has up his sleeve is that he has found a way to make the piano sound as if it could levitate. Messiaen would not be Messiaen if bells did not peal in his music to signal the opening up of the heavens and if birds did not sing. But Taylor somehow created the illusion that bird song came from various places around the hall and that some of the bells came from beyond the shoreline.

"Vingt Regards" ends with a 15-minute paean to love. To love of God and of existence. But also to love of love. Taylor by this point was sopping wet and looked spent. He was breathing heavily and loudly. Music that transcends physicality became all about physicality. Like an athlete going beyond his capacity, like an actor transforming himself into another being, Taylor disappeared deeper and deeper into Messiaen's louder and louder tintinnabulations.

When it was over, he became himself again and walked offstage just as if he had delivered a lecture, as if revelation were all in a day's work. It was a great performance.

mark.swed@latimes.com