Debussy was a tonic trailblazer ; a musical innovator who revolutionised non merely Gallic music at a clip when it was stagnating and withdrawing from the universe phase, but the full Western musical tradition every bit good. Almost all subsequent manners which followed were either straight or indirectly affected by his originality, for illustration wind, atonalism and minimal art. After Debussy ‘s important part to the repertory nil, to repeat a cliche , was of all time the same once more in musical footings. However, it is exactly his striking invention which has rendered Debussy so hard to categorize. Musicologists encounter no problem in labelling Mozart a ‘Classical ‘ composer or Liszt a ‘Romantic ‘ , yet how to catalogue Debussy ‘s works has presented critics with a riddle for many decennaries ; and is one, as yet, without a universally recognized solution. The most widely-utilised term in mention to the composer ‘s composings is without uncertainty ‘Impressionism ‘ , and is widely accepted by those who do non analyze music, and besides by some who do, as a exclusive definition of his plants. But can this label truly encompass a compositional calling that spans so many different manners and inventions? This essay will endeavor to reply this inquiry, and to turn out that Impressionism entirely is non a just appraisal of Debussy ‘s music ; that he is, despite there being features from a figure of aesthetic motions found in his plant, about impossible to sort.
Debussy ‘s 2nd envoy de Rome precipitated the first of all time visual aspect of the tag ‘Impressionism ‘ sing his plants. In a unfavorable judgment of his orchestral and vocal piece Printemps ( 1887 ) , the Secretary to the Academie des Beaux-Arts opined:
‘One has the feeling of musical coloring material exaggerated to the point where it causes the composer to bury the importance of precise building and signifier. It is to be strongly hoped that he will guard against this obscure Impressionism, which is one of the most unsafe enemies of truth in plants of art. ‘
This was a gross misinterpretation and misreading of Debussy ‘s purposes, and one which has stuck doggedly and mistakenly of all time since. Before the grounds why this is such a misnomer is discussed, it must be acknowledged that it is possible to depict some of Debussy ‘s music as Impressionistic.
‘Impressionism ‘ was foremost applied to painting as a label as a effect of Claude Monet ‘s picture Impression, soleil Levant ( 1872 ) .Impressionism was a subordinate of the wider impression of Realism.Stefan Jarocinski encapsulates the motion impeccably, explicating that Impressionists were ‘concerned with prehending the image of a world which had non yet been deformed by the intercession of the intelligence ‘ and wanted to make a ‘pure feeling ‘ ; that is, unblemished by the domain of mind. The Impressionists, in short, were purveyors of sensualness.
It must be understood that labelling Debussy in such footings is non wholly invalid. Although he was composing mostly after the flower of the Impressionist painters ( the 1860s, 70s and 80s ) , some of his composings ( viz. La mer [ 1903-05 ] and Images [ 1904-08 ] ) do expose qualities and inclinations associated with this motion. Debussy himself wrote to the editor of the La revue musicale, Emile Vuillermoz, in 1916, stating: ‘You do me a great honor by naming me a student of Claude Monet. ‘It is true to state that a figure of the composer ‘s artistic rules correspond to those expressed or implied by the Impressionists. For case, during a dry run for the premiere of La mer ( 1903-05 ) , in reply to conductor Chevillard who had expressed confusion at Debussy ‘s specified pacing differing from that of the old twenty-four hours, the composer replied: ‘but I do n’t experience music the same manner every day’.On a wider degree, this statement can be interpreted as being compatible with the common Impressionist pattern of painting the same scene at different times of the twenty-four hours ( for illustration, Monet ‘s Water Lilies or Haystacks ) .
Several painters of the motion in inquiry were inspired by similar stimulations as Debussy. A premier illustration of this is their esteem of Nipponese creative person Hokusai, whose famed woodblock print appeared on the screen page of La mer ( 1903-5 ) , as stipulated by Debussy.Like the Impressionist painters, once more, he made frequent usage of H2O as an inspiration for his compositions.See below a apposition of Sisley ‘s Watermill at the Bridge of Moret in Winter ( Ex. 1, 1893 ) and an infusion from Debussy ‘s ‘Reflets dans l’eau ‘ from the first volume of Images ( Ex. 2, 1905 ) . Note how the rise and falling semitone figure is an evocation of the wane and fluxing motion of the H2O.
Ex. 1 Ex. 2
In drumhead, Stefan Jarocinski, despite differing with the application of the term in mention to Debussy, hails Impressionism as ‘the domination of musical coloring material over signifier and design, ‘an averment that could surely depict his musical strong beliefs of other elements ‘ subservience to chant coloring material and the rejection of recognized traditional signifiers and harmonic rules. Even his biographer, Louis Laloy, claims that Debussy ‘s music is ‘a strictly audile music, merely as Impressionist picture is wholly ocular. ‘
However, even Debussy ‘s alleged ‘Impressionist ‘ pieces can non be described as entirely affiliated with this motion. For case La mer ( 1903-05 ) , although its word picture of the sea is obvious in its music every bit good as its rubric, can non simply be interpreted as an ‘entirely ocular ‘ centripetal experience, without intension. As piano player Paul Roberts writes, the sea has frequently been used to stand for subjects of love and muliebrity. The clip at which it was written was one of emotional turbulence for Debussy, as he left his married woman Lilly Texier for another, Emma Bardac. Equipped with this cognition, it seems that La mer occupied a deeper, psychologically psychotherapeutic intent that lies beyond the purposes of the Impressionist painters.
The Academie ‘s remarks on Debussy ‘s Printemps, and by extension, his other plants, is an inaccurate, reactionist and narrow rating based on musical conservativism. The label, as argued by E. Robert Schmitz, has been damaging to position of the composer ‘s plants of all time since. He laments that it has resulted in countless flawed and misguided public presentations with usage of inordinate pedal.His composings are in fact anything but vague ; they are precise and fastidious. In add-on, conversely to the common misconception that his piano pieces are indistinct and loaded with pedal usage, he really utilises the piano in a consummate manner which shows a deep apprehension of the instrument and its parametric quantities. In contradiction to the common misconception as outlined by Schmitz, his music is frequently percussive instead than vague, for illustration the gap bars of ‘La serenade interrompue ‘ ( Ex. 3, from Preludes, Book 1, 1909-10 ) , which imitates a Spanish guitar, decidedly staccato. Further analyses of his plants reveal the usage of Golden Sections, exposing a preciseness and mathematical component to his composings that is rather extraordinary.
Ex. 3
It must besides be noted that Debussy himself rejected the unfortunate label assigned to him, as expressed in a missive to his publishing houses in 1908: ‘I am seeking to make ‘something different ‘ – in a manner, worlds – what the idiots call ‘impressionism, ‘ a term which is as ill used as possible, peculiarly by art critics. ‘Regarding this, it could be interpreted that the composer disagreed with the label itself instead than the aesthetic, as ‘reality ‘ is exactly what the Impressionists hoped to convey. However, one must profess that if the composer was n’t himself happy with the term, and if his music seldom displays qualities which are characteristic of the motion, so it is accurate to state that specifying Debussy as an Impressionist is non a valid classification.
About as normally circulated a term in mention to Debussy is Symbolism. This is a much fairer appraisal of his music. The motion, which has its beginnings in the Hagiographas of Charles Baudelaire, grew rapidly in Paris during the latter half of the 19th century. In brief, Symbolism was a reaction against Realism, and can be seen as about the antithesis of Impressionism. Its followings were concerned with externalising, through the agencies of art, the internal, and frequently infernal, universe of the head, dreams and the supernatural. There is unimpeachable grounds to aline Claude Debussy with Symbolism. To get down with, it was a motion rooted in literary origins.Debussy, despite being mostly uneducated in any subject but music, was ‘well-read’and had ‘a passion for literature’that permeated through to his composings. His strongest influences were words and authors instead than the ocular humanistic disciplines ( although Symbolism was n’t entirely a literary motion ; it existed in art excessively ) .
Debussy gravitated towards Symbolist beliefs, and forged close friendly relationships with noteworthy figures associated with the motion, such as Paul Bourget and Stephane Mallarme , whose literary salon he was a regular attendant of.Much of his music was overtly Symbolist in character. Prelude a l’apres-midi d’un faune ( 1892-94 ) , the orchestral tone verse form that took his acknowledgment to a new degree wholly, is based on a verse form by Mallarme . Its capricious flute gap ( Ex. 4 ) is tonally and rhythmically equivocal, portraying the indistinct dreams of the eponymic faun ; a cardinal subject in Symbolist doctrine.
Ex. 4
There is plentifulness of non-musical grounds to back up Debussy ‘s association with the Symbolist motion. In 1901 he began to compose for a Symbolist periodical, La Revue blanche, and his Chansons de Bilitis ( 1897-8 ) , every bit good as their words being written by Debussy ‘s close friend and Symbolist Pierre Louys, was published by Librairie de l’art independant, a Symbolist publishing house.
Mediaevalism, or to be more accurate, pseudo-Mediaevalism, a nucleus Symbolist acceptance, is prevailing in many plants. The imitation of cloistered organum music ( Ex. 5 ) in the gap bars of ‘La cathedrale engloutie ‘ ( From Preludes, Book 1, 1909-10 ) is a premier illustration, as is the fact that Pelleas et Melisande ( 1893-5 ) , is set in ‘Allemonde ‘ ( literally ‘Other World ‘ ) , an imagined Mediaeval scene.
Ex. 5
Pelleas et Melisande ( 1893-5 ) , Debussy ‘s lone opera, based on a drama by author Maurice Maeterlinck, heralds the zenith of his association with the Symbolist motion. It makes frequent usage of symbolism ( for illustration hair to picture erotism ; light and shade to supply conceptual symbols of doomed love ) . Analogues can be drawn with Wagner, whom Symbolists admired ardently, and who influenced Debussy greatly in the earlier old ages of his compositional calling. Both Wagner ‘s Tristan and Isolde ( 1875-9 ) and Pelleas are calamities, usage leitmotif and have common subjects of love and decease. Debussy was as enthusiastic a protagonist of his predecessor as any Symbolist, holding visited Bayreuth in 1888 and 1889.However, his Wagnerism and Symbolism waned shortly after the first public presentation of Pelleas. Furthermore, in 1893 he declared his purpose to compose an article entitled ‘The Futility of Wagnerism ‘ which, although it ne’er materialised, suggests a pronounced displacement in his values.This is why it is every bit invalid to depict Debussy ‘s music entirely in footings of Symbolism as it is Impressionism. Both labels represent merely a fraction of his artistic end product and neglect to admit that between Pelleas and La mer, a alteration occurred in his music that was reliant on neither poets nor creative persons, which could propose that his ain alone voice was eventually established after old ages of musical geographic expedition.
In 1889 Debussy had an experience which was to significantly change the nature of his composings. During a visit to the Universal Exposition he encountered the sound of the Javanese gamelan for the first time.The pentatonic key he heard was to be incorporated into some of his most famed composings, for case in ‘Pagodes ‘ from the piano triptych Estampes ( 1903 ) , whose blue and gold screen arousing Japan, every bit good as music exemplifies the Exoticism that the composer incorporated into so many of his pieces. Debussy ‘s love of Spain filters through in the 2nd motion, ‘Soiree dans Grenade ‘ , in which a habanera beat underpins the piece ( Ex. 6 ) . Equally good as Exoticism, it can be interpreted that Debussy ‘s music contains elements of the Pre-raphaelite motion ( La damoiselle elue, 1887-8, the text of which was written by Dante Gabriel Rossetti ) and even the Romantics ( there are sometimes common subjects between their beliefs and thoughts expressed in Debussy ‘s composings, for illustration escaping by agencies of travel and antiquity ) .
Ex. 6
Debussy himself christened all labels ‘useful footings of maltreatment, ‘recognising the arbitrary nature of bring downing any kind of class upon his plants. As Paul Dukas wrote in 1901: ‘his music is unclassifiable ‘ . Debussy was a extremist who defies categorization because he is so different to his predecessors and encompasses so many different manners and motions, which is why musicologist brush such difficultly in seeking to pigeonhole him. Beethoven is frequently described as being both Classical and Romantic. Debussy was besides a ‘giant ‘ amongst composers in this sense, building a span between tradition and modernness and emancipating harmonic convention. He instigated a musical passage ; pre-empted the hereafter. His bequest is far excessively great to depict in such narrow a term as Impressionism.