{"id":5798,"date":"2012-08-22T07:32:19","date_gmt":"2012-08-22T12:32:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=5648"},"modified":"2012-08-22T07:32:19","modified_gmt":"2012-08-22T12:32:19","slug":"claude-debussy-at-150-we-take-his-musical-revolution-for-granted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2012\/08\/22\/claude-debussy-at-150-we-take-his-musical-revolution-for-granted\/","title":{"rendered":"Claude Debussy at 150: We take his musical revolution for granted"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Today marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Claude Debussy, one of Western music’s revolutionaries.<\/p>\n

As with the varying styles of Impressionist paintings, the long view represents something defined, but the closer you get, the more his compositions start to fall apart into the individual components that our minds work imperceptibly to piece together into meaningful shapes.<\/p>\n

The long view is so sleek and seductive that listeners long ago began taking Debussy’s art for granted.<\/p>\n

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Rather than go into a long discourse, here’s a handful of videos that illustrate different facets of what makes his music special. Note how, despite sounding “beautiful,” the music is not based on traditional harmony or counterpoint. It should sound stranger than it does.<\/p>\n

We’ll start with a short lecture by English composer and pianist Percy Grainger from 1948, followed by him playing “Pagodes” (from 1903’s Estampes<\/em>), inspired by Indonesian gamelan music Debussy heard in 1888:<\/p>\n