Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 07/16/2014, uploaded on 12/04/2014

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Claude Debussy wrote two books of preludes, completed in 1910 and 1913.  He placed evocative titles at the end of each prelude, thus downplaying their programmatic aspects.

Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir (“Sounds and scents swirl in the evening air”) is inspired by Baudelaire’s famous poem, Harmonie du Soir:

                                  Now is the time when, vibrating on its stem,

                                  each flower exhales in vapor like incense from a censer;

                                  Sounds and scents mingle in the evening air;

                                  Melancholy waltz and languorous vertigo!

Minstrels is a humorous prelude that pays tribute to the American minstrel groups that performed in Europe around 1900. Minstrel shows were put on by household servants on American plantations, but would later be performed at street fairs.      Anna Khanina

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 Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir, from Préludes, Book I     Claude Debussy

Claude Debussy composed his two books of preludes during a remarkably brief period—the first, between December 1909 and February 1910; and the second, during roughly the same period in 1912-13. Though totaling twenty-four in number between the two books, Debussy’s preludes do not follow the precedent established by J. S. Bach’s ubiquitously known Well-Tempered Clavier (namely, a prelude in each of the major and minor keys) and imitated by several other composers, including Frédéric Chopin, Charles-Valentin Alkan, and Sergei Rachmaninoff. However, this does not mean that Debussy’s preludes are without order, and the relationships that can be found among them indicate that their published order was, to a certain extent, quite purposeful, yet also designed with a degree of inherent flexibility. Debussy, in keeping with the artistic philosophy of his day, also composed each prelude with specific scene or image in mind. Yet, to partially disguise these intents from the listener and to allow his audience to discover them of their own accord, Debussy craftily placed his titles at the end of each prelude. Performance practice of the preludes varies. Early performances, even by Debussy himself, established a precedent of grouping the prelude in threes or fours, allowing performers to pick those in which they perhaps are most comfortable. However, some performers also choose to perform each book in their entirety.

The fourth prelude of Book I, “Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir” (“The sounds and fragrances swirl through the evening air”), takes both its title and inspiration from the poetry of Charles Baudelaire. It is a gentle waltz-like piece in A major with melodies that seem to float as effortlessly as the sounds and fragrances in Baudelaire’s line. Even the harmonies seem tinged with a dusky hue, giving musical evocation to the twilight setting. The prelude is built around three principal ideas and embodies a sort of ternary design, with a brief middle section in the key of A-flat major. It is gentle and subdued, and nowhere is to be found a disturbing phrase or melodic figure. The only true point of contrast within the prelude is a melody in octaves accompanied by a persistent sixteenth-note countermelody. This, however, simply returns us to a variant of the opening melodic motif and the prelude’s serene close.      Joseph DuBose

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.