Debussy, Claude (1862-1918)

[HighlandDougie]

I've become really intrigued by Albert Ferber’s recording of the etudes. Is there anyone else who makes these etudes sound so beautiful? And makes them sound so consistent with Debussy's style in other music like Preludes II.


I just tried to listen to Joseph Moog play the first book, and though it's clearly fabulous pianism, I felt it didn't have the magic of Ferber. Somehow Moog seemed reductive, reducing the music to thrills about speed and piano technique. Ferber makes them sound to me like some of Debussy's best poetry.


Here, if you don't know it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gk_bU7nlX2c&ab_channel=OnTheTopofDamavandforever

Ferber was one of Gieseking’s students - I think there’s only one recording of Gieseking playing the etudes and I like Ferber much more!

A pianist I associate with Saga Records - and Fauré but, at 9 euros for the 5 CD set, his Debussy duly ordered

[Serial_Apologist]

I've become really intrigued by Albert Ferber’s recording of the etudes. Is there anyone else who makes these etudes sound so beautiful? And makes them sound so consistent with Debussy's style in other music like Preludes II.


I just tried to listen to Joseph Moog play the first book, and though it's clearly fabulous pianism, I felt it didn't have the magic of Ferber. Somehow Moog seemed reductive, reducing the music to thrills about speed and piano technique. Ferber makes them sound to me like some of Debussy's best poetry.


Here, if you don't know it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gk_bU7nlX2c&ab_channel=OnTheTopofDamavandforever

Ferber was one of Gieseking’s students - I think there’s only one recording of Gieseking playing the etudes and I like Ferber much more!

Ferber does it by glossing or glissing over the sharp harmonic corners of the late Debussy - which maybe Debussy himself would have preferred to the manner in which many of today's interpreters choose rather to bring them out. In some instances with Ferber this works by emphasising whimsy and ironic charm, at others something gets overridden and lost, though in general I do like his approach. But I'm now 77 - I wouldn't have said this 20 0r 30 years ago!

[Mandryka]

Ferber does it by glossing or glissing over the sharp harmonic corners of the late Debussy - which maybe Debussy himself would have preferred to the manner in which many of today's interpreters choose rather to bring them out. In some instances with Ferber this works by emphasising whimsy and ironic charm, at others something gets overridden and lost, though in general I do like his approach. But I'm now 77 - I wouldn't have said this 20 0r 30 years ago!

Oh, you’ve made me feel older! Hate Ferber now, I demand sharp edges!

[Mandryka]

A pianist I associate with Saga Records - and Fauré but, at 9 euros for the 5 CD set, his Debussy duly ordered

The Fauré is absolutely outstanding, he is in his element with it.

There’s also some Schubert on Hyperion which I found a bit disappointing.

[smittims]

Are there any Debussy experts out there who can answer this one?

I've read more than once that at the end of his life Debussy was engaged on a projected series of six chamber works, of which those for violin, cello, and flute/viola/harp were completed. The story then goes 'the unfinished sonata was for oboe, horn and harpsichord'.

Apart from the highly unusual, not to say bizarre, combination of instruments , this makes only four, not six, works. I've wondered if 'sonata was' is a mistranslation of 'sonatas were', that is, an oboe sonata, a hor sonata, and a harpsichord sonata (perhaps intended for Wanda Landowska). Can anyone confirm this?

It's curious that Saint-Saens did write an oboe sonata after Debussy's death.

[Belgrove]

The Wiki article

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_sonatas_for_various_instruments

gives information and references.

[RichardB]

The Wiki article gives information and references.

It might be interesting also to note that one of the instrumental groups in Boulez's Domaines, for oboe, horn and amplified guitar, is a deliberate reference to Debussy's unwritten sonata.

[smittims]

Many thanks, that's fascinating. I've never read, and in fact never seen, a detailed standard biography of Debussy, who appears to have been a very private man.

[Serial_Apologist]

It might be interesting also to note that one of the instrumental groups in Boulez's Domaines, for oboe, horn and amplified guitar, is a deliberate reference to Debussy's unwritten sonata.

I remember, many years ago, listening to Mémoriale for the first time with my then-girlfriend, and afterwards turning to her and saying "whose music does this most remind you of", and her immediate response, coinciding with my own, was "Debussy", adding "especially the Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp". Since then I've found more and more correspondences, in-depth as it were, with Debussy, most immediately in terms of the ambiences Boulez created but the ingredients, instrumentations, combinations, even his melodic and harmonic formulations. I would argue for this Debussyian influence being even deeper than in the more overtly referential cases of some of the Spectralist composers, Murail particularly, but even the pre-Spectralist Messiaen, who of course "ran" with an initially narrowing spectrum of harmonic discoveries along with the rhythmic implications, as had Stravinsky in Le sacre, but in a slightly different way.

[Serial_Apologist]

Many thanks, that's fascinating. I've never read, and in fact never seen, a detailed standard biography of Debussy, who appears to have been a very private man.

Was there a book consisting of Debussy's critical writings on music and other composers, which was said to be revealing about himself? Or am I imagining things?!

[Joseph K]

Was there a book consisting of Debussy's critical writings on music and other composers, which was said to be revealing about himself? Or am I imagining things?!

This?

Three Classics in the Aesthetic of Music by Claude Debussy | Goodreads

[Serial_Apologist]

This?

Three Classics in the Aesthetic of Music by Claude Debussy | Goodreads

Thanks JK - that's possibly the one.

[smittims]

There's also 'Debussy Remembered' by Rogar Nichols (Faber), essentially a collection of memoirs of the man by people who knew him personally.

[RichardB]

I would argue for this Debussyian influence being even deeper than in the more overtly referential cases of some of the Spectralist composers

Well yes. In particular, Jeux was pored over by both Boulez and Stockhausen and strongly influenced both, as well as Ligeti, who remarks in a later interview that all the serial composers were talking about it in the 1950s - you hear the influence much more clearly in Boulez, but Stockhausen analysed Jeux for a radio broadcast in 1954 and it had a decisive influence on the gestural structures of Gruppen. As for Messiaen, though, his 8 Preludes issue straight from Debussy i terms of piano texture, although rhythmically, as you say, he was interested in something less flowing and more angular.

[Mandryka]

There are some lovely Debussy like Holderin settings by Wolfgang Rihm.

Anyone read Barraqué’s book on Debussy? Is it very technical, for serious analytic music scholars only?