Estampes -Debussy

• Typical devices in 'La Soirée dans Grenade'

  • Pedal points
  • Parallel 7th chords (e.g. bar 17)
  • Whole-tone harmonies (e.g. bar 23)
  • False relations between adjacent chords (e.g. bar 33)
  • Open 5ths chords (e.g. bar 38)
  • Chords of 5ths and 4ths (bar 38, last quaver)
  • Simultaneous false relation (e.g. bar 52)
  • Parallel triads (bars 109-110)
• The harmonic vocabulary in 'La Soirée dans Grenade' is much more varied than in 'Pagodes'
• Harmonisation approach

  • 'Changing background' approach, i.e. changing harmonisations of the same melody
  • The added 6th (B-D-F#-G#) at the start
• Prominent landmarks

  • Extended chords, e.g. B¹3 (bar 7)
  • Diminished triad (bar 16²)
  • Colouristic, isolated major 2nd (bar 32)
• The harmony in 'La Soirée dans Grenade' is strongly affected by the pentatonic content of the melody
• Pentatonic harmonisation

  At bar 37, with parallelism and open 5th chords
• Whole-tone element in melody

  Bar 33
• 'La Soirée dans Grenade' is built on a limited number of melodic motifs
• Tempo in 'Pagodes' is 'modérément animé' (moderately quickly)
• Melodic line

  • G-C-D-F
  • B
• Conventional dynamic marks are employed in both pieces
• Rhythmic variation of melody

  Introduction of triplets at bar 11
• Dynamic range in 'La Soirée dans Grenade' ranges from ppp to ff
• Time signature in 'Pagodes' is simple quadruple (4)
• Final pentatonic motif in melody

  Bar 37
• Both pieces use nearly the full range of the piano
• Change of pentatonic pattern in melody

  1. Bars 15-18: G#-A-C-D-F

  2. Line E-D-C-B
• Melodic motifs in 'La Soirée dans Grenade'

  • 'Andalusian'-Arabic melody at bar 7
  • Lining up of semitone and augmented 2nd
• Texture in 'La Soirée dans Grenade' draws on various types of homophony
• Distinguishing feature in 'La Soirée dans Grenade' is its habanera rhythm
• Estampes ('Prints) was written in 1903
• Debussy: 'Music should not be 'confined to reproducing, more or less exactly, Nature, but the mysterious correspondences which link Nature with Imagination''
• There are three pieces in Estampes, the last of which is 'Jardins sous la pluie' ('Gardens in the rain'), based on a French folk song
• Estampes was the first of Debussy's piano works to be regarded as truly impressionistic
• The prescribed works in Estampes show influences of Indonesian gamelan music ('Pagodes') and Spanish music ('La soirée dans Grenade')
• Debussy's approach to music is more symbolist than impressionist, where the work of art becomes a symbol of a concept or idea, rather than a specific evocation of the real world
• Debussy first became acquainted with the Javanese gamelan at the Paris World Exhibition in 1889, influencing the sonority and melodic content of 'Pagodes' through the use of pentatonic scale
• Characteristics of Estampes

  • Emphasis on colour and texture
  • Music not designed to be programmatic but allusive