Olivier Messiaen

Un Oiseau des arbres de Vie (Oiseau Tui) pour Orchestre

Drawing its material from the tui bird from New Zealand, Un oiseau des arbres de Vie (Oiseau Tui) was originally envisaged as the third movement of Éclairs sur l'Au-Delà..., Messiaen's last completed work. Despite having written all of the music in short score, the composer reluctantly decided to omit this remarkable movement from Éclairs at a relatively late stage. This realisation of Un oiseau des arbres de Vie (Oiseau Tui) is based on Messiaen's annotations in the short score, supplemented by precedents from the music of Éclairs and the composer's other final works.