Got up close and personal with the ondes martenot for a very good half-an-hour this morning, having discovered on YouTube Messiaen's sensationally mellifluous Fete des Belles Eaux which features no fewer than six of the instruments. Then moved on to a brilliantly informative account of how Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead fame sort of saved the ondes for a modern audience. To be honest, I think the very existence of Messiaen's Turangalila Symphony, which, amazingly, gets regularly programmed in the concert hall to this day, is a guarantee that the instrument will survive, featured as it is so heavily in that great work. But it's good to know that manufacture of the ondes has considerably expanded since it's become something of a signature of the Radiohead sound post OK Computer.
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