Claude Debussy's ''Six sonatas for various instruments, composed by Claude Debussy, French musician'' () was a projected cycle of sonatas that was interrupted by the composer's death in 1918, after he had composed only half of the projected sonatas. He left behind his
sonatas for cello and piano (1915), flute, viola and harp (1915), and violin and piano (1916–1917).
History
From 1914, the composer, encouraged by the music publisher
Jacques Durand, intended to write a set of six sonatas for various instruments, in homage to the French composers of the 18th century. The
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, along with the composers
Couperin
The Couperin family was a musical dynasty of professional composers and performers. They were the most prolific family in French musical history, active during the Baroque era (17th—18th centuries). Louis Couperin and his nephew, François Coup ...
and
Rameau
Jean-Philippe Rameau (; – ) was a French composer and music theorist. Regarded as one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the 18th century, he replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and ...
, inspired Debussy as he was writing the sonatas.
Durand, in his memoirs entitled ''Quelques souvenirs d'un éditeur de musique'', wrote the following about the sonatas' origin:
After his famous String Quartet, Debussy had not written any more chamber music. Then, at the Concerts Durand, he heard again the Septet with trumpet by Saint-Saëns and his sympathy for this means of musical expression was reawoken. He admitted the fact to me and I warmly encouraged him to follow his inclination. And that is how the idea of the six sonatas for various instruments came about.
In a letter to the conductor Bernard Molinari, Debussy explained that the set should include "different combinations, with the last sonata combining the previously used instruments". His death on 25 March 1918 prevented him from carrying out his plan, and only three of the six sonatas were completed and published by Durand, with a dedication to his second wife,
Emma Bardac.
Sonatas
Sonata for cello and piano
The sonata for cello and piano,
L. 135, was written in 1915, and is notable for its brevity, most performances not exceeding 11 minutes. It is a staple of the modern cello repertoire and is commonly regarded as one of the finest masterpieces written for the instrument.
The work has three
movements
Movement may refer to:
Common uses
* Movement (clockwork), the internal mechanism of a timepiece
* Motion, commonly referred to as movement
Arts, entertainment, and media
Literature
* "Movement" (short story), a short story by Nancy Fu ...
:
The final two movements are joined by an
attacca. Instead of
sonata form
Sonata form (also ''sonata-allegro form'' or ''first movement form'') is a musical structure generally consisting of three main sections: an exposition, a development, and a recapitulation. It has been used widely since the middle of the 18th c ...
, Debussy structures the piece in the style of the eighteenth-century monothematic sonata, and was particularly influenced by the music of
François Couperin.
The piece makes use of
modes
Mode ( la, modus meaning "manner, tune, measure, due measure, rhythm, melody") may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* '' MO''D''E (magazine)'', a defunct U.S. women's fashion magazine
* ''Mode'' magazine, a fictional fashion magazine which is ...
and whole-tone and pentatonic
scales
Scale or scales may refer to:
Mathematics
* Scale (descriptive set theory), an object defined on a set of points
* Scale (ratio), the ratio of a linear dimension of a model to the corresponding dimension of the original
* Scale factor, a number w ...
, as is typical of Debussy's style. It also uses many types of extended cello technique, including left-hand
pizzicato
Pizzicato (, ; translated as "pinched", and sometimes roughly as "plucked") is a playing technique that involves plucking the strings of a string instrument. The exact technique varies somewhat depending on the type of instrument :
* On bowe ...
,
spiccato
Spiccato is a bowing technique for string instruments in which the bow appears to bounce lightly upon the string. The term comes from the past participle of the Italian verb ''spiccare'', meaning "to separate". The terms '' martelé'', '' saltan ...
and
flautando
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner.
Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the st ...
bowing, false harmonics and portamenti. The piece is considered technically demanding.
Whether descriptive comments related to
characters
Character or Characters may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''Character'' (novel), a 1936 Dutch novel by Ferdinand Bordewijk
* ''Characters'' (Theophrastus), a classical Greek set of character sketches attributed to The ...
of the
Commedia dell'arte were actually given by Debussy to cellist
Louis Rosoor remains unclear.
Sonata for flute, viola and harp (or Piano)
The sonata for flute, viola, and harp (or piano),
L. 137, was also written in 1915.
The first performance of the Sonata took place in Boston, at Jordan Hall in the New England Conservatory, on 7 November 1916. The performers were members of a wind ensemble called the Longy Club, which had been founded by the principal oboist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, George Longy. The first performance in France was a private one that occurred on 10 December 1916, at the home of Debussy's publisher, Jacques Durand. The first public performance in France was thought to be at a charity concert on 9 March 1917. However, Thompson (1968) reported a performance of the sonata at London's
Aeolian Hall by Albert Fransella,
Harry Waldo Warner
Harry Waldo Warner (4 January 1874 - 1 June 1945) was an English viola player and composer, one of the founding members of the London String Quartet and a several times Cobbett Award winner for his chamber music.
Early life
Born in Northampton ...
and
Miriam Timothy Miriam Timothy (24 February 1879 – 1950) was a British harpist and teacher. She was a soloist, played with many London orchestras and taught harp at the Royal College of Music.
Life
Miriam Timothy was born in London on 24 February 1879, daughter ...
on 2 February 1917 as part of a concert otherwise given by the
London String Quartet
The London String Quartet was a string quartet founded in London in 1908 which remained one of the leading English chamber groups into the 1930s, and made several well-known recordings.
Personnel
The personnel of the London String Quartet was:
...
. A typical performance lasts between 17 and 18 minutes.
According to
Léon Vallas
Léon Vallas (17 May 1879 in Roanne – 9 May 1956 in Lyon) was a 20th-century French musicologist.
Biography
Orphaned at 8 years of age, after studying at the St. Mary's Institution at St. Chamond, held by the Marists, he passed his baccalaure ...
(1929), Debussy initially planned this as a piece for flute, oboe and harp. He subsequently decided that the viola's timbre would be a better combination for the flute than the oboe's, so he changed the instrumentation to flute, viola and harp. The
instrumentation
Instrumentation a collective term for measuring instruments that are used for indicating, measuring and recording physical quantities. The term has its origins in the art and science of scientific instrument-making.
Instrumentation can refer to ...
would later become a standard ensemble instrumentation.
The work has three movements:
Sonata for violin and piano
The sonata for violin and piano in G minor,
L. 140, was written in 1917. It was the composer's last major composition and is notable for its brevity; a typical performance lasts about 13 minutes. The premiere took place on 5 May 1917, the violin part played by
Gaston Poulet
Gaston Poulet (10 April 1892 – 14 April 1974) was a French violinist and conductor. He played an important part in the diffusion of the contemporary music of the first half of the 20th century. His son Gérard Poulet, born in 1938, is also a vio ...
, with Debussy himself at the piano. It was his last public performance.
The work has three movements:
The unfinished sonatas
Debussy wrote in the manuscript of his violin sonata that the fourth sonata should be written for oboe,
horn
Horn most often refers to:
*Horn (acoustic), a conical or bell shaped aperture used to guide sound
** Horn (instrument), collective name for tube-shaped wind musical instruments
*Horn (anatomy), a pointed, bony projection on the head of various ...
, and
harpsichord, and the fifth for trumpet, clarinet, bassoon and piano.
[Henry Prunières ''La Revue musicale, Numéros 258 à 259''. Éditions Richard-Masse, 1964]
page 140
.
For the final and sixth sonata, Debussy envisioned ''a concerto where the sonorities of the "various instruments" combine, with the gracious assistance of the double bass'',
making the instrumentation:
:Flute
:Oboe
:Clarinet
:Bassoon
:Horn
:Trumpet
:Harp
:Piano
:Harpsichord
:Violin
:Viola
:Cello
:Double bass
The idea of combining the instruments oboe,
horn
Horn most often refers to:
*Horn (acoustic), a conical or bell shaped aperture used to guide sound
** Horn (instrument), collective name for tube-shaped wind musical instruments
*Horn (anatomy), a pointed, bony projection on the head of various ...
, and
harpsichord, inspired
Thomas Adès
Thomas Joseph Edmund Adès (born 1 March 1971) is a British composer, pianist and conductor. Five compositions by Adès received votes in the 2017 Classic Voice poll of the greatest works of art music since 2000: '' The Tempest'' (2004), '' ...
to write his ''Sonata da Caccia'', and the combination of the instruments trumpet, clarinet, bassoon and piano, inspired
Marc-André Dalbavie
Marc-André Dalbavie (born 10 February 1961 at Neuilly-sur-Seine, France) is a French composer.Anne Sédès, "Marc-André Dalbavie", ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' He had his first music lessons at age 6.Lyle Chan
Lyle Chan is an Australian composer known for his unique approach of writing cumulative works with only one work per genre.
He has described his music as a diary or memoir, particularly of emotions.
“I call it a perpetual work in progress," ...
has written three sonatas for the same combinations of instruments as in the three unfinished Debussy sonatas.
[ Australian National Academy of Music, "Music Makers", Vol. 26, May 2018, p. 3 ]
Bibliography
*
References
;Notes
;Sources
*
*Thompson, K.L. (Oct 1968). First performance? ''The Musical Times'', ''109'' (1508), 914–15.
*
External links
Performance of Cello Sonataby David Requiro (cello) and Elizabeth DeMio (piano) from the
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts, which houses significant examples of European, Asian, and American art. Its collection includes paintings, sculpture, tapestries, and decorative arts. It was found ...
in
MP3
MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany, with support from other digital scientists in the United States and elsewhere. Origin ...
format
*
Recordingperformed by
Nicola Benedetti
Nicola Joy Nadia Benedetti (born 20 July 1987) is an Italian-British classical solo violinist and festival director. Her ability was recognised when she was a child, including the award of BBC Young Musician of the Year when she was 16. She w ...
, violin and Julien Quentin, piano from the
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts, which houses significant examples of European, Asian, and American art. Its collection includes paintings, sculpture, tapestries, and decorative arts. It was found ...
in
MP3
MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany, with support from other digital scientists in the United States and elsewhere. Origin ...
format
Sheet music
*
*
*
{{Claude Debussy
Chamber music by Claude Debussy
Debussy
(Achille) Claude Debussy (; 22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) was a French composer. He is sometimes seen as the first Impressionist composer, although he vigorously rejected the term. He was among the most influential composers of the ...
Debussy
(Achille) Claude Debussy (; 22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) was a French composer. He is sometimes seen as the first Impressionist composer, although he vigorously rejected the term. He was among the most influential composers of the ...
1917 compositions