Editing Claude Debussy (section)

==Style==
=== Debussy and Impressionism ===
[[File:Impression-soleil-levant.jpg|thumb|alt=painting of a sunrise over a seascape|[[Claude Monet|Monet]]'s ''[[Impression, Sunrise|Impression, soleil levant]]'' (1872), from which "Impressionism" takes its name]]
The application of the term "Impressionist" to Debussy and the music he influenced has been much debated, both during his lifetime and since. The analyst [[Richard Langham Smith]] writes that Impressionism was originally a term coined to describe a [[Impressionism|style of late 19th-century French painting]], typically scenes suffused with reflected light in which the emphasis is on the overall impression rather than outline or clarity of detail, as in works by [[Claude Monet|Monet]], [[Camille Pissarro|Pissarro]], [[Pierre-Auguste Renoir|Renoir]] and others.<ref name=rls>Langham Smith, Richard. [http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780199579037.001.0001/acref-9780199579037-e-3397 "Impressionism"], ''The Oxford Companion to Music'', Oxford University Press, 2011, retrieved 17 May 2018 {{subscription}}</ref> Langham Smith writes that the term became transferred to the compositions of Debussy and others which were "concerned with the representation of landscape or natural phenomena, particularly the water and light imagery dear to Impressionists, through subtle textures suffused with instrumental colour".<ref name=rls/>

Among painters, Debussy particularly admired [[J. M. W. Turner|Turner]], but also drew inspiration from [[James Abbott McNeill Whistler|Whistler]]. With the latter in mind the composer wrote to the violinist [[Eugène Ysaÿe]] in 1894 describing the orchestral ''Nocturnes'' as "an experiment in the different combinations that can be obtained from one colour – what a study in grey would be in painting."<ref>Weintraub, p. 351</ref>

Debussy strongly objected to the use of the word "Impressionism" for his (or anybody else's) music,{{refn|In a letter of 1908 he wrote: "I am trying to do 'something different' – an effect of reality&nbsp;... what the imbeciles call 'impressionism', a term which is as poorly used as possible, particularly by the critics, since they do not hesitate to apply it to [J.M.W.] [[J. M. W. Turner|Turner]], the finest creator of mysterious effects in all the world of art."<ref>Thompson, p.&nbsp;161</ref>|group= n}} but it has continually been attached to him since the assessors at the Conservatoire first applied it, opprobriously, to his early work ''Printemps''.<ref>Jensen, p. 35</ref> Langham Smith comments that Debussy wrote many piano pieces with titles evocative of nature – "Reflets dans l'eau" (1905), "Les Sons et les parfums tournent dans l'air du soir" (1910) and "Brouillards" (1913){{refn|Respectively, Reflections in the Water, Sounds and Perfumes Swirl in the Evening Air, and Mists.<ref name=rls/>|group= n}} – and suggests that the Impressionist painters' use of brush-strokes and dots is paralleled in the music of Debussy.<ref name=rls/> Although Debussy said that anyone using the term (whether about painting or music) was an imbecile,<ref>Fulcher, p. 150</ref> some Debussy scholars have taken a less absolutist line. Lockspeiser calls ''La mer'' "the greatest example of an orchestral Impressionist work",<ref name=s109/> and more recently in ''The Cambridge Companion to Debussy'' Nigel Simeone comments, "It does not seem unduly far-fetched to see a parallel in Monet's seascapes".<ref name=s109>Simeone (2007), p. 109</ref>{{refn|[[Roy Howat]] writes that Debussy, like Fauré "often juxtaposes the same basic material in different modes or with a strategically shifted bass" which, Howat suggests, is "arguably his most literal approach to true Impressionist technique, the equivalent of Monet's fixed object (be it cathedral or haystack) illuminated from different angles".<ref name=grove/>|group= n}}

In this context may be placed Debussy's [[pantheism|pantheistic]] eulogy to Nature, in a 1911 interview with [[Henry Malherbe]]:
{{blockquote|I have made mysterious Nature my religion&nbsp;... When I gaze at a sunset sky and spend hours contemplating its marvellous ever-changing beauty, an extraordinary emotion overwhelms me. Nature in all its vastness is truthfully reflected in my sincere though feeble soul. Around me are the trees stretching up their branches to the skies, the perfumed flowers gladdening the meadow, the gentle grass-carpeted earth,&nbsp;... and my hands unconsciously assume an attitude of adoration.<ref>Vallas, p. 225. The interview was published in ''Excelsior'' magazine on 11 February 1911.</ref>|}}

In contrast to the "impressionistic" characterisation of Debussy's music, several writers have suggested that he structured at least some of his music on rigorous mathematical lines.<ref>Iyer, Vijay. [https://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/oct/15/fibonacci-golden-ratio "Strength in numbers: How Fibonacci taught us how to swing"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160510101435/http://www.theguardian.com/music/2009/oct/15/fibonacci-golden-ratio |date=10 May 2016 }}, ''The Guardian'', 15 October 2009</ref> In 1983 the pianist and scholar [[Roy Howat]] published a book contending that certain of Debussy's works are proportioned using mathematical models, even while using an apparent classical structure such as [[sonata form]]. Howat suggests that some of Debussy's pieces can be divided into sections that reflect the [[golden ratio]], which is approximated by ratios of consecutive numbers in the [[Fibonacci sequence]].<ref>Howat (1983), pp. 1–10</ref> Simon Trezise, in his 1994 book ''Debussy: La Mer'', finds the intrinsic evidence "remarkable", with the caveat that no written or reported evidence suggests that Debussy deliberately sought such proportions.<ref>Trezise (1994), p. 53</ref> Lesure takes a similar view, endorsing Howat's conclusions while not taking a view on Debussy's conscious intentions.<ref name=grove/>

=== Musical idiom ===
[[File:Debussy's chords for Guiraud.png|thumb|alt=musical score showing a sequence of 22 different chords, each with 3, 4 or 5 notes|upright=1.0|Improvised chord sequences played by Debussy for Guiraud<ref>Nadeau, Roland. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3395721 "Debussy and the Crisis of Tonality"], ''Music Educators Journal'', September 1979, p. 71 {{subscription}}; and Lockspeiser, Appendix B</ref>]] [[File:Chords from dialogue with Ernest Guiraud.wav|thumb|Chords from dialogue with Ernest Guiraud]]Debussy wrote "We must agree that the beauty of a work of art will always remain a mystery [...] we can never be absolutely sure 'how it's made.' We must at all costs preserve this magic which is peculiar to music and to which music, by its nature, is of all the arts the most receptive."<ref name=n198010>Nichols (1980), p. 310</ref>

Nevertheless, there are many indicators of the sources and elements of Debussy's idiom. Writing in 1958, the critic [[Rudolph Reti]] summarised six features of Debussy's music, which he asserted "established a new concept of tonality in European music": the frequent use of lengthy [[pedal point]]s – "not merely bass pedals in the actual sense of the term, but sustained 'pedals' in any voice"; glittering passages and webs of figurations which distract from occasional absence of tonality; frequent use of [[parallel chord]]s which are "in essence not harmonies at all, but rather 'chordal melodies', enriched unisons", described by some writers as non-functional harmonies; bitonality, or at least [[bitonal]] chords; use of the [[Whole-tone scale|whole-tone]] and [[pentatonic scale]]s; and [[unprepared modulation]]s, "without any harmonic bridge". Reti concludes that Debussy's achievement was the synthesis of monophonic based "melodic tonality" with harmonies, albeit different from those of "harmonic tonality".<ref>Reti, pp. 26–30</ref>

In 1889, Debussy held conversations with his former teacher Guiraud, which included exploration of harmonic possibilities at the piano. The discussion, and Debussy's chordal keyboard improvisations, were noted by a younger pupil of Guiraud, Maurice Emmanuel.<ref name=Nichols1980/> The chord sequences played by Debussy include some of the elements identified by Reti. They may also indicate the influence on Debussy of [[Erik Satie|Satie]]'s 1887 ''[[Sarabandes (Satie)|Trois Sarabandes]]''.<ref>Taruskin (2010), pp. 70–73.</ref> A further improvisation by Debussy during this conversation included a sequence of whole tone harmonies which may have been inspired by the music of [[Mikhail Glinka|Glinka]] or [[Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov|Rimsky-Korsakov]] which was becoming known in Paris at this time.<ref>Taruskin (2010), p. 71.</ref> During the conversation, Debussy told Guiraud, "There is no theory. You have only to listen. Pleasure is the law!" – although he also conceded, "I feel free because I have been through the mill, and I don't write in the [[fugue|fugal]] style because I know it."<ref name=Nichols1980>Nichols (1980), p. 307</ref>