Yvonne Loriod, piano
The American composer Elliot Carter criticized Messiaen's music as vulgar, I think it's because his conception of reality was not the same as Carter's, not due to any actual defect in the music, itself. I think what Carter really didn't like was Messiaen's Christian, specifically Catholic mysticism, something which in one way or other motivated and informed his music. Certainly if the likes of Eliot Carter found it vulgar, many other musicians didn't share his opinion. You get to decide for yourself.
In the past decade or so, this has replaced American pop music Christmas for me, that has a lot to do with my giving up listening to the increasingly unlistenable American radio programming and totally avoiding going to the store during December. I don't miss it.
Yvonne Loriod was married to Olivier Messiaen, I believe he wrote just about all of his piano music with her playing in mind. I have, twice, posted the entire cycle one vision of the incarnation at a time. I wanted Loriod's playing to start out with and found this posting of the entire piece with the score, it's more than two hours of music, just to let you know. It's not music you can really listen to while doing housework.
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