The Works of Claude Debussy - Essay Example

Program s Claude Debussy Claude Debussy created his works as a response to the impressionist era, emulating the paintings and literature that was being produced with their delicate nuance and unusual forms. Debussy was also inspired by the beauty of nature, as were the pictorial Impressionist paintings that also revealed themes of nature’s serenity (Schmitz 3). Debussy said “Music has this over painting: it can bring together all manner of variations of color and light - a point not often observed though it is quite obvious” (Halford and Debussy 2). His work evokes the essence of mystery, luminescent and in motion as it becomes an emotional fantasy (Halford and Debussy 2). Perhaps one of the greatest of all French composers, Claude Debussy was born in 1862 and lived until 1918. He is considered a pivotal figure in the transition between the late-Romantic period into the period of the modernists (Brook 129). He is considered the founder of the Impressionist school of music, but he found the concept of Impressionism to be unimpressive and thought it was used quite badly (Halford and Debussy 2). However, his influence during this period was remarkable and his work is considered to be the perfect example of Impressionist music. Debussy was considered part of the Symbolism movement in France, his dark tones emulating the more gothic reminiscence of the late-Romantic period. However, it is impossible to put Debussy into any one movement of the time period, each new work expressing aspects of yet another part of the world of the arts. Debussy used all forms of art; painting, literature, and music, to express his aesthetics. “Avoiding any direct translation of feeling, the composer (meaning Debussy) endeavors to reproduce the most remote harmonics suggested by poems or by his own impressions; he thus creates symbols of symbols” (Vallas 118). Reverie In 1890, Debusy sold five piano pieces which were most likely been composed long before that year. Reverie was most likely written between 1880 and 1884, although the original work no longer exists (Woodstra, Brennan and Schrott 355). One of those pieces was Reverie, written for piano and despite his own ambivalence about the piece, destined to be one of his most popular (Bachus 31). According to Valas, “(Reverie) contains some unusual harmonies and a certain amount of pianistic padding, and reveals the composers taste for reoccurring designs” (70). Debussy wrote of the piece “It was a mistake to bring out the Reverie. It is an unimportant work which was written in a great hurry to oblige Hartman: in other words, It is bad” (Valas 70). Decades of pianists have not agreed. The piece begins with a “modal accompaniment figure that starts on the weakest bar”. As the melody begins, the rhythm has instability between the two parts which is then obscured through the “wandering modal orientation of the harmony”. It isn’t until the sixth bar that the piece really begins to develop. The work has a “largely arpeggiated accompaniment that is rich in suspensions such as sevenths, ninths and seconds” (Woodstra Brennan, and Schrott 355). The mood and emotions of the piece are light and tranquil, moving the listener in its melodic soothing voice. There is a simplicity to the piece that is deceptive in the way in which it lures the listener into its sphere. If ones pays attention to the details of the structure of the composition especially to bring out the effect of the long notes and the clarity of the phrasing, the message becomes like a dream to the listener. There is the insinuation of jazz chords within the piece despite the melancholy peaceful melody that runs throughout. The mood shifts between a sweetness to a melancholy, the dissonance in contrast to passages that have a defined resolution. As I perform this piece, I feel like I am floating, moving from one soft vista to the next. My emotions rise and fall, bringing the gentility of a smile in one moment, then evoking a subtle sorrow in the next. The melody shifts into a central theme, telling a story that can be defined by the listener as much as the player. When the music shifts into a more mysterious, whimsical mood, there is a sense that the story has changed, that someone has come into the scene, and that there is something or someone affecting the next moment, until it finally falls effortlessly, like a feather on the wind, back into the melodious duality. Arabesque No.1 According to Fulcher “Harmony was not, for Debussy, merely an outcome of the linear aspect of music defined by rhythm and melody” (164). Debussy became known for his novelty, for the way in which the weaving magic of the tones seemed wondrous and spontaneous. He intended for all of his music to seem like improvisation, although the delicate intricacies have a complexity that draws the listener in, holding them in an gentle, but insistent embrace. Arabesque No. 1 is a piece that has a quality that holds the listener entranced, its movement with only some variation in the beginning before the music falls in a lustrous spiral, much like the dropping of a butterfly from on high. It moves as if effortlessly, caressing the somewhat hidden melodies with delicate runs that seem to sprinkle themselves liberally over the landscape of the base structure of the piece. The runs lead up to the chord progressions, that mostly bring us back down, never quite hitting the ground before bringing us back up and into the sky once more. As much as Reverie is a dream, so is Arabesque No. 1 a flight of fantasy. Arabesque No. 1 was written in 1888, along with his only other Arabesque. It is likely that they are titled such as he was greatly influenced by what he termed Bach’s “adorable arabesques”. In these works he has not yet come into his Impressionistic aesthetics (Debussy and Banowetz iii). While the piece appears to be simple, the complexity starts with the 2v3 (quavers against the triplets pattern, which the listener should carefully tune into in order to understand the depth of the complexity that Debussy has wrought. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was a child prodigy who began to play the piano, experimenting with sounds and intervals, at the age of three. His first surviving symphony that he wrote, Symphony K-16, was written when he was age seven. Mozart traveled throughout Europe performing as a child and impressing his audience with his ability to hear a piece once then rewrite it perfectly on parchment. He was born in 1756, surviving until 1791 when he died of an still unknown disease that rendered his joints swollen with a high fever. During the time of his death he was writing the Requiem, which is often thought of to have been for his own death (The Mozart Forum). Mozart is considered one of the most important, if not the greatest composers, of all time. He was prolific in his short life, producing enough music to fill an orchestral symphony’s program list for more than a year. His work has a simplicity that is deceptive, a whimsy that should never be mistaken for a lack of substance, and despite its symmetrical feel, the music is complicated through the unusual details that can be found within the compositions. Mozart’s music is “never symmetrical, regular, or conventional as it appears; it takes close listening to notice the subtle irregularities and hidden asymmetries that makes his music so great” (Vigeland 32). In 1782, Mozart began to write music that was beyond good, but was something very new. Mozart was seventeen, and began to change the structure of his music in a way that revolutionized the period. Architecturally, he expanded his symphonies to have four movements, widened the variety in the orchestration, increased the complexity of the counterpoint, and significantly enlarged the emotional resonance (Vigeland 37). When Mozart began to compose, the structure of music was intended to be normative, placating the nobility for whom it was written so that they had a certain level of fulfilled expectation. As Mozart revolutionized music, he brought a certain artistry to the work that was not evident in many of the composers of the time. Sonata in F major K.332 In the opening measure of the first movement of Sonata in F major K.332 titled commedia dell’arte, “a wistful aria gives way to learned counterpoint followed by a minuet cadence, itself rounded off a nostalgic evocation of hunting horns (Giger and Mathiesen 196). The third movement is lively and expressive as the runs slide impressively with technical specificity that is situated in a strength and agility that has whimsy and aesthetic delicacy. The piece was written in the summer of 1778, most likely for the use of his students that he taught in Vienna at the time (the American Music Teacher 5). Little is known about the publication and dissemination of Mozart’s sonatas during his lifetime. There are a lot of discrepancies between known original copies, which either suggests that Mozart made changes as he reproduced his works, or others interfered with what he was doing (Irving xv). However, Mozart was an avid publisher of his works, thus preserving them with only some confusion on their full origins. References Bachus, Nancy. Beyond the Romantic Spirit: 1880-1922. Van Nuys, Calif: Alfred Publishing Co, 2003. Musical score. Debussy, Claude, and Joseph Banowetz. Piano Works. Performing artist series. S.l.: Belwin Mills, 2000. Musical score. Fulcher, Jane F. Debussy and His World. Princeton [u.a.: Princeton Univ. Press, 2001. Print. Giger, Andreas, and Thomas J. Mathiesen. Music in the Mirror: Reflections on the History of Music Theory and Literature for the 21st Century. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2002. Print. Gutman, Robert W. Mozart: A Cultural Biography. San Diego, CA: Harcourt, 2000. Print. Halford, Margery and Claude Debussy. An Introduction to His Piano Music. Alfred Pub Co, 1984. Print. Irving, John. Mozarts Piano Sonatas: Contexts, Sources, Style. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1997. Print. Schmitz, E R. The Piano Works of Claude Debussy. New York, N.Y: Dover Publications, 1950. Print. The American Music Teacher. Cincinnati, Ohio, etc.: Music Teachers National Association, q1951. Print. The Mozart Forum. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The Mozart Forum, 2010, Web. 14 October 2010. Vallas, Leon. Claude Debussy: His Life and Works. New York: Read Books, 2008. Vigeland, Carl A. The Mostly Mozart Guide to Mozart. New York: Lincoln Center, 2009. Print. Woodstra, Chris, Gerald Brennan, and Allen Schrott. All Music Guide to Classical Music: The Definitive Guide to Classical Music. San Francisco, CA: Backbeat Books, 2005. Print. Read More