Impressionism was a movement that revolutionized not only painting but also music. Starting in the 1860s, French painters no longer felt they should only paint within the confines of their studios, but could do so outdoors, where they could try to capture fleeting moments of light, shadow and rippling water. The style of Claude Monet, Jean Renoir, and others came to be called Impressionist because the goal was to record their impressions of nature, rooted in an instant of perception and feelings.
Parallel to art, a modernist movement in music began towards the last decade of the 19th century, and Claude Debussy was the “Monet of Impressionistic music.” Like the Impressionist artists, Debussy was more interested in atmosphere than traditional form and logic. “I love music passionately,” he said, “and because I love it I try to free it from barren traditions that stifle it. It is a free art … an open-air art, an art boundless as the elements, the wind, the sky, the sea!”
For Debussy, there was no need for music to make people think; it was enough if music could make them feel. Armed with this philosophy, he composed highly original pieces that were languid and dreamlike such as Clair de Lune (Moonlight), his first famous work, Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, arguably his most well-known composition. Prelude is an orchestral work based on a famous erotic poem by his friend, Mallarme. In Mallarme’s poem, a faun from ancient myth lies dreaming of making love with a nymph. Debussy places his version in a new tonal mood, creating a sighing melody in the lowest range of the flute. The surreal piece unfolds like a waking dream, with harmonies drifting unresolved and melodies floating like the breath of the wind. This unique work ushered in musical modernism, and it would go on to influence later modernist composers, including Bela Bartok in Hungary, and Charles Ives and George Gershwin in America.
Listen
Moonlight (Pianist: Lang Lang)
Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun (Orchestre National De Lyon, directed by Emmanuel Krivine, Denon records).