Pianist Robson Takes On, Masters a Herculean Task

Messiaen’s “Twenty Contemplations of the Child Jesus” expresses a complex and uncommonly sustained mysticism, an intensely passionate love of both God and creation.

It does so with all manner of musical symbolism--metaphors of rhythm and harmony, texture and sound--over more than two hours of some of the most technically daunting writing for solo piano.

But for all its spiritual elevation and intellectual abstraction, this mega-suite is fundamentally sensuous, inescapably rooted in the thrill of lavish sonority and kinetic pulse. It was on those terms that Mark Robson overwhelmed the sprawling piece and a large, rapt Piano Spheres audience, Tuesday at the Neighborhood Church in Pasadena.

We knew going in that Robson must be a brave heart but possibly also a foolish one, deluded by affection or ambition. He was tackling the 20th century equivalent of Liszt’s “Transcendental Etudes,” taxing every facet of piano playing, while attempting to connect a postmodern audience to mystical topics such as “The First Communion of the Virgin” and “Contemplation of the Awesome Unction.”

But whatever Messiaen’s inspiration, these 20 contemplations--by no means an exclusively serene or reflective bunch--start as music about the piano and pianism. Handle that part and transcendence has a chance. Fail and no amount of interpretive special pleading will make them more than self-absorbed bores.

Robson did it. And in those simple words lies a herculean accomplishment, requiring virtuoso power and agility, a philosopher’s combination of integration and speculation, and a gift for the ultimately expressive sound.

Robson might have profited from bringing a page-turner into the project, particularly in the inebriated dance that Messiaen called “Contemplation of the Spirit of Joy.” But the crisp rip of frantically flipped pages was the only distraction in Robson’s world, a fascinating and renewing recreation of an idiosyncratic monument.