He suggests that some of Debussy’s pieces can be divided into sections that reflect the golden ratio, frequently by using the numbers of the standard Fibonacci sequence. 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. In this, he was a profound influence on composers as diverse as Bartok, Webern, Arnold Schoenberg, and Varese. The sonatas, written during the war, seem to outline a new, more concise, almost elliptical style, perhaps due to a new vision, or just because he was in pain when he wrote them.
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• It was their view that Western harmony had exhausted it potentialities as a potent emotive syntax by the end of the nineteenth century.

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• In October 1905 La mer, Debussy’s most substantial orchestral work, was premiered in Paris by the Orchestre Lamoureux under the direction of Camille Chevillard; the reception was mixed.

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• It made Debussy a well-known name in France and abroad; The Times commented that the opera had “provoked more discussion than any work of modern times, excepting, of course, those of Richard Strauss”.

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• 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.

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• Ravel once remarked that upon hearing Debussy’s music, he first understood what real music was..

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• 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.

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Conductor: Pierre Boulez

Yet he had no real desire to spend three years in Rome, writing more music to please the Conservatoire moguls while unable to visit his mistress. Repelled by the gossip and scandal arising from this situation, he sought refuge for a time at Eastbourne, on the south coast of England. In addition to the composers who influenced his own compositions, Debussy held strong views about several others. Debussy did not give his works opus numbers, apart from his String Quartet, Op. 10 in G minor (also the only work where the composer’s title included a key). It made Debussy a well-known name in France and abroad; The Times commented that the opera had “provoked more discussion than any work of modern times, excepting, of course, those of Richard Strauss”. The Apaches, led by Ravel (who attended every one of the 14 performances in the first run), were loud in their support; the conservative faculty of the Conservatoire tried in vain to stop its students from seeing the opera.

Debussy: Images for Piano

Ravel once remarked that upon hearing Debussy’s music, he first understood what real music was.. 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. Nevertheless, Debussy protested his label as “Father of Impressionism in music,” and academic circles too believe that the term might be a misnomer. He dedicated Children’s Corner for piano to his daughter, whose sweetness and love would quell his depressions. Since his death, France has celebrated him as one of the most distinguished ambassadors of its culture, and his music is repeatedly heard in film and television. At the 1889 Exposition Universelle, he heard gamelan music from Java and the sometimes violent music of the Annamite Theatre of Vietnam.

Top Debussy pieces

• Since his death, France has celebrated him as one of the most distinguished ambassadors of its culture, and his music is repeatedly heard in film and television.

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• He wrote for orchestra–Fêtes galantes and a work called La Mer (The Sea)–which he wrote while he lived in Brighton, England.

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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.

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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).

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• Although considering Images “the pinnacle of Debussy’s achievement as a composer for orchestra”, Trezise notes a contrary view that the accolade belongs to the ballet score Jeux.
• 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.

Above all he went to Bayreuth—the great German Wagner festival—and heard Parsifal and Casinojoy casino Tristan und Isolde for the first time. 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. Less individual, for good reasons, are the cantatas he wrote as set pieces for the Prix de Rome.

Piano

Here again he bids farewell to a large late-Romantic orchestra, favoring a smaller ensemble that lends itself to an exploration of orchestral colors and timbres of the instruments. Debussy became a close friend of a wealthy composer and member of Franck’s circle, Ernest Chausson. Debussy received piano instruction from Chopin’s pupil Madame de Fleurville, and being very gifted, entered the Paris Conservatoire when he was 11 years old. 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.

Entre Ardenne et Bretagne

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• Debussy did not give his works opus numbers, apart from his String Quartet, Op. 10 in G minor (also the only work where the composer’s title included a key).

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• The composer’s greatest works are built on a classical structure, such as a sonata, but they also appear to have been structured around mathematical models, as Howat observed.

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• This enabled him to convey nebulous and haunting melodies, whose textures, sensations, images, and nuances in sound were unprecedented in his time.

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• 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.
• His works have strongly influenced a wide range of composers including Béla Bartók, Igor Stravinsky, George Gershwin, Olivier Messiaen, George Benjamin, and the jazz pianist and composer Bill Evans.

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• The sonatas, written during the war, seem to outline a new, more concise, almost elliptical style, perhaps due to a new vision, or just because he was in pain when he wrote them.

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String Quartet in G Minor and the orchestral prelude “L’Apres midi d’un faune,” composed between 1893 and 1894, were the first masterpieces of the new style. This early style is well illustrated in one of Debussy’s best-known compositions, Clair de lune. Bartók first encountered Debussy’s music in 1907 and later said that “Debussy’s great service to music was to reawaken among all musicians an awareness of harmony and its possibilities”. Not only Debussy’s use of whole-tone scales, but also his style of word-setting in Pelléas et Mélisande, were the subject of study by Leoš Janáček while he was writing his 1921 opera Káťa Kabanová. The application of the term “Impressionist” to Debussy and the music he influenced has been much debated, both during his lifetime and since. Although considering Images “the pinnacle of Debussy’s achievement as a composer for orchestra”, Trezise notes a contrary view that the accolade belongs to the ballet score Jeux.
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famous adverts that used classical music to evoke emotion

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He wrote to his wife on 11 August from Dieppe, telling her that their marriage was over, but still making no mention of Bardac. The course included music history and theory studies with Louis-Albert Bourgault-Ducoudray, but it is not certain that Debussy, who was apt to skip classes, actually attended these.