It was in this spirit that Debussy wrote the symphonic poem Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune (1894). His single completed opera, Pelléas et Mélisande (first performed in 1902), demonstrates how the Wagnerian technique could be adapted to portray subjects like the dreamy nightmarish figures of this opera who were doomed to self-destruction. In his work, as in his personal life, he was anxious to gather experience from every region that the imaginative mind could explore. In the music of Palestrina, Debussy found what he called "a perfect whiteness", and he felt that although Palestrina's musical forms had a "strict manner", they were more to his taste than the rigid rules prevailing among 19th-century French composers and teachers. Debussy's orchestral works include Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune (1894), Nocturnes (1897–1899) and Images (1905–1912).
Late period
- At times these divisions seem to follow the standard divisions of the overall structure; elsewhere they appear to mark out other significant features of the music.
- The three Nocturnes for Orchestra, Pelleas and Melisande, La Mer, and Images established his reputation as one of the most influential composers in post-Wagnerian and the twentieth century music.
- Although they did not make any great impact with the public they were well reviewed by musicians including Paul Dukas, Alfred Bruneau and Pierre de Bréville.
- He did find Debussy displeasing, though, not only for his philosophy when it came to human relationships but also because of Debussy's recognition as the composer who developed Avant-Garde music, which Ravel maintained was plagiarism of his own Habanera.
- Debussy's last orchestral work, the ballet Jeux, written for Serge Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, contains some of his strangest harmonies and textures in a form that moves freely over its own field of motivic connection.
- In his final years, he focused on chamber music, completing three of six planned sonatas for different combinations of instruments.
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Claude-Emma, affectionately known as "Chouchou", was a musical inspiration to the composer (she was the dedicatee of his Children's Corner suite). He originally studied the piano, but found his vocation in innovative composition, despite the disapproval of the Conservatoire's conservative professors. He took many years to develop his mature style, and was nearly 40 when he achieved international fame in 1902 with the only opera he completed, Pelléas et Mélisande. Some of it is difficult to play like the Études Casinojoy casino and pieces such as L’isle joyeuse (The Happy Island). He wrote for orchestra--Fêtes galantes and a work called La Mer (The Sea)--which he wrote while he lived in Brighton, England.
Conductor: Pierre Boulez
From around 1900 Debussy's music became a focus and inspiration for an informal group of innovative young artists, poets, critics, and musicians who began meeting in Paris. Although they did not make any great impact with the public they were well reviewed by musicians including Paul Dukas, Alfred Bruneau and Pierre de Bréville. In May 1898 he made his first contacts with André Messager and Albert Carré, respectively the musical director and general manager of the Opéra-Comique, Paris, about presenting the opera.
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- Later commentators have rated some of the late works more highly than Newman and other contemporaries did, but much of the music for which Debussy is best known is from the middle years of his career.
- At the 1889 Exposition Universelle, he heard gamelan music from Java and the sometimes violent music of the Annamite Theatre of Vietnam.
- He wrote to his wife on 11 August from Dieppe, telling her that their marriage was over, but still making no mention of Bardac.
- Claude Debussy (born August 22, 1862, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France—died March 25, 1918, Paris) was a French composer whose works were a seminal force in the music of the 20th century.
- He had long known and been fascinated by these works in the published scores but resisted the Wagnerism that was infecting much French music of the day.
- The opera is composed in what Alan Blyth describes as a sustained and heightened recitative style, with "sensuous, intimate" vocal lines.
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The 25 greatest conductors of all time
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- He developed a highly original system of harmony and musical structure that expressed in many respects the ideals to which the Impressionist and Symbolist painters and writers of his time aspired.
- In Paris during this time he fell in love with a singer, Blanche Vasnier, the beautiful young wife of an architect; she inspired many of his early works.
- In his work, as in his personal life, he was anxious to gather experience from every region that the imaginative mind could explore.
- It was in this spirit that Debussy wrote the symphonic poem Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune (1894).
- Repelled by the gossip and scandal arising from this situation, he sought refuge for a time at Eastbourne, on the south coast of England.
- According to Pierre Louÿs, Debussy "did not see 'what anyone can do beyond Tristan'," although he admitted that it was sometimes difficult to avoid "the ghost of old Klingsor, alias Richard Wagner, appearing at the turning of a bar".
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It is clear that he was torn by influences from many directions; these stormy years, however, contributed to the sensitivity of his early style. Lesure writes, "The development of free verse in poetry and the disappearance of the subject or model in painting influenced him to think about issues of musical form." Debussy was influenced by the Symbolist poets. Debussy was much in sympathy with the Symbolists' desire to bring poetry closer to music, became friendly with several leading exponents, and set many Symbolist works throughout his career. Estampes for piano (1903) gives impressions of exotic locations, with further echoes of the gamelan in its pentatonic structures. The central "Jeux de vagues" section has the function of a symphonic development section leading into the final "Dialogue du vent et de la mer", "a powerful essay in orchestral colour and sonority" (Orledge) which reworks themes from the first movement. In 1903 there was public recognition of Debussy's stature when he was appointed a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur, but his social standing suffered a great blow when another turn in his private life caused a scandal the following year.
Ensemble: Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra
According to Pierre Louÿs, Debussy "did not see 'what anyone can do beyond Tristan'," although he admitted that it was sometimes difficult to avoid "the ghost of old Klingsor, alias Richard Wagner, appearing at the turning of a bar". In 1889, Debussy held conversations with his former teacher Guiraud, which included exploration of harmonic possibilities at the piano. A further improvisation by Debussy during this conversation included a sequence of whole tone harmonies which may have been inspired by the music of Glinka or Rimsky-Korsakov which was becoming known in Paris at this time. Debussy's musical development was slow, and as a student he was adept enough to produce for his teachers at the Conservatoire works that would conform to their conservative precepts. His early mélodies, inspired by Marie Vasnier, are more virtuosic in character than his later works in the genre, with extensive wordless vocalise; from the Ariettes oubliées (1885–1887) onwards he developed a more restrained style.
