Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 07/20/2012, uploaded on 01/09/2012

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

L’isle Joyeuse was written in 1904 and is believed to have been inspired by a painting of Watteau “The Embarkment for Cythere”. The complex rhythmic patterns and playful, graceful, dance elements intertwine in very interesting sound textures, based on whole- tone series, chromatic scales, and polytonal passages. Debussy surprises us with vivid gestures that explore the entire spectrum of the keyboard, using every sound and pedal effect available on the modern piano. The middle section is absolutely enchanting, but as the piece gets to the end the different elements rotate rapidly, building excitement and snowballing into a coda that builds to a tremendous crescendo.  With its trumpet fanfares and brilliant chordal statement of the theme, the coda’s kaleidoscopic orchestral quality expresses exuberant joy.    Luba Poliak

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L’isle joyeuse     Claude Debussy

Composed in 1903-04, L’isle joyeuse (“The Happy Isle”) is a single-movement work for the piano and a trademark piece of Debussy’s mature compositional style. Debussy took his inspiration for the piece from Jean-Antoine Watteau’s Rococo painting L'Embarquement pour Cythère (“The Embarkation for Cythera”). Cythera, one of the Greek isles, according to legend is the birthplace of Venus, the goddess of love. In Watteau’s painting, illustrating the joyous and pleasurable time enjoyed by the French aristocracy following the death of Louis XIV, an amorous couple is seen in the presence of a statue of Venus, while others, encircled by cupids, make their way down a hill to a golden boat. Some have speculated that the painting is, in fact, a departure from the island of Cythera, suggesting the brevity of love and perhaps coinciding better with Debussy’s chosen title.

Fashioned in a sort of modified sonata form in A major, Debussy begins L’isle joyeuse with a cadenza-like passage of brilliant and rapid figurations that lead to the piece’s principal theme. This energetic subject is based predominantly on the Lydian mode but later, with the arrival of a related idea, adopts the whole-tone scale. Appearing roughly a third of the way into the piece is the lyrical second subject in a rich diatonic A major, with only occasional inflections from the Lydian mode and set against rippling arpeggio quintuplets. Throughout the development, fragments of both themes are heard amongst the interesting and lush textures which Debussy so masterfully could usher forth from the piano. Each theme is given a reprise in the recapitulation. However, the second theme’s return is delayed with much expectation so as to gives its fortissimo rendering near the end greater weight. Following this climatic reprise, an altered form of opening cadenza brings the piece to a brilliant conclusion.      Joseph DuBose

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.