Imagine this, if you will: a
gorgeous, pre-Raphaelite temple (to no particular god) set amidst the sublime
landscape of the Himalayas. You arrive for the performance of a
lifetime—namely, Alexander Scriabin’s magnum opus, Mysterium, a work for
orchestra, chorus, soloists, dancers, odors, colors, and perhaps the earth
itself, which is to last an entire week.
At the conclusion of the work, the audience, along with the performers
and the composer himself will die—ascending to the heavens in a state of cosmic
bliss. In other words, the end of the world.
A kitschy bit of 21st century avant-garde postmodern performance
art? Hardly...it was a work Scriabin
conceived around 1909 and worked on feverishly until his death in 1915. Scriabin began life as a virtuoso-composer in
the mold of Chopin or Liszt, writing conventionally perfumed piano music in
traditional forms—Preludes, Mazurkas, Etudes.
After an apprentice period which also saw the composition of two
symphonies and a piano concerto, Scriabin immersed himself in the writings of
Nietszche and conceived more grandiose ambitions for his music. This only intensified once he became a member
of the Theosophical Society and sought to embody the beliefs of Madame
Blavatsky in art. His piano music
all-but departed from tonality, and he invented what he termed the “chord of
the pleorma” (later called the “mystic chord”) which became the basis for many
late compositions. [read more about it
here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mystic_chord]. Indeed, his middle and late music seemed to
be as much about sight and smell as music itself, and he developed an elaborate
system of colors correlating to each musical note (a system that other
contemporaries, such as Rimsky-Korsakov, also espoused). By the turn of the century, Scriabin seemed
poised to be the messiah of a new branch of composition that would change music—and
indeed, the world—forever. But it was
not to be: he tragically died of a lip infection at the tragically young age of
43, before many of his ideas could reach fruition.
