You make some wonderful points. There is, however, a distinctly French aesthetic that predates both Satie and Debussy. It's in the spoken language, in the art (Boucher, Watteau)...in almost everything throughout France's history. You allude to the French emphasis on charm, and that's very important. There is also, in my view, a strong respect for humor in French music (Satie, Milhaud, Poulenc, Saint Saens). And, perhaps more than any of this, there is a certain detachment in French arts (visual, musical, literary, etc.). Even when Debussy's works are marked "sad" in the music (triste), it doesn't sound like Debussy's sadness. Instead, it sounds like the idea of sadness--as if sadness exists without someone to feel it. That detachment (when the work isn't about self expression, but wise observation) is--for me--the quality that allows all the other typically French qualities to live so vibrantly. Thank you for making a video about a subject I've thought abut my entire adult life.
Thank you for making this comment, these were some fantastic observations that I agree with and there is a lot of evidence to back up what you are saying and where that may have emerged from. Feel free to keep in touch at theartismagistra@gmail.com as I'd like to access your commentary and ideas more regularly, and please let me know if you have written about these sorts of things more extensively anywhere, if not, feel free to write freely to me on any of these topics you may have thought about as you may feel like it, and to read these ideas would be an honor really and a great gift.
Some nice analysis here. Another French composer whose work shares some features with Satie and Debussy, yet who had her own distinct style, was Lili Boulanger. Some beautiful use of parallelism and ambiguous tonality in her work, as well as exquisite orchestration.
Talking about rule books, it was French composer Rameau the one who wrote the great harmony treatise focusing on the notion of "fundamental". Maybe the Germans were playing by the French rule book all along.
Hahaha true, true! To an extent. Rameau's treatise is quite different from the voice-leading style of Bach though, if you go through the rules he lays out
@@InsidetheScore But Bach's voice-leading style was 1) not the foundation for Haydn, Mozart Beethoven 2) dates back to late renaissance counterpoint: Palestrina of course and on the other route through Schütz and his huge influence on german protestant music back to Gabrieli and Lassus. And ultimately all that dates back to Josquin, Ockeghem, Du Fay... and from there to ars nova and ars antiqua, where we find French composers again. Music history didn't start with Bach's generation, and what Bach did was in no way avantgarde or forward-looking in his time... he didn't do anything that composers before him didn't do already...
@@jasonschwartzmanstein9661 Bach was pretty conservative in his time. He wrote great music, but not avant-garde music. Telemann was more avant-garde as him. What I said is not about how good his music is, but how is it placed in his time.
Please, PLEASE, do a video on Prelude à laprès-midi d'un faune! It is an incredible piece with so much to uncover, to learn, and to experience. Its impact on the world of music cannot be understated, and would make for a perfect theme for one of your productions! Nonetheless, it is by far my favourite piece, and seeing you cover it in any way or form would be incredible! Keep up your good work; your videos are works of art!
There's a RUclips video of a lecture by Leonard Bernstein, called "The Delights and Dangers of Ambiguity," one of six lectures delivered at Harvard in the early 1970s. The final part of it is an analysis of the Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. You might find that worth a look.
@@stravinskyfan but when you learn how to fly like the butterfly, on your instrument, you gain the ability to step into this world of music yourself. I want to understand how to play with chords and improvise as though I'm in the same place as these amazing peices. Such amazing beauty.
I have realized that most of my favorite composers are French: Saint-Saëns, Berlioz, Fauré, Satie, Debussy. Maybe it's because I have been introduced to classical music with Le Carnaval des Animaux from Saint-Saëns and Le Boléro from Ravel? Éric Satie is an acquired taste though. When I was younger, I thought his Gymnopédie was boring. Now, I listen to it often. That and Gnossienne No1, one of his best, in my opinion.
this was great, I really appreciated it, as a self-taught adult student of the piano I'm always wondering what the theory is behind what I'm trying to play (I know how chords are named, and things like circle of fifths, II-V-I, etc) but what you explained is something I could not have figured out by myself, many, many thanks. I do hope you do more.
Thank you for this wonderful exposition on the artistic and political context of this revolutionary breaking of the “rules” of tonality. I am realizing that the French music profiled here predates the very earliest jazz music by a decade or so. The influence on the harmonic language of jazz must be huge. From a “dominant” chord being simply another chord, even the home chord, not requiring resolution, which is so essential to the tonality if the Blues. Then there is the complete parallelism of “planning” (such as Ellington’s The Mooche), chord extensions, the distinctive disorientation of the whole tone scale (which made it into the jazz language a bit later, notably with Monk). I’m sure it’s not a coincidence given the big cultural influence of French culture in New Orleans, birthplace of jazz. It was a former French territory after all (hence the name Louisiana), and French-speaking, classically trained creole musicians famously played a big part in the development of early jazz.
What characterizes French art, more than anything else, is "mannerism". Even in the most economical works, whether musical (Ravel and Debussy), architectural (Jean Nouvel) painterly (Ingres, Gauguin) or literary (Baudelaire, Hugo), the stroke has a shape to it, so one gets a sense that it was made by a human. In French we say "maniéré" and as in English, the root is the latin for "hand". Nothing specific about Debussy sounds French, your statement would only be true if you heard it for the first time, without knowing he was French. But in hindsight, there is this residual mannerism in his strokes that are common in French art.
Music as we know it in the West evolved from religious feeling that followed the "rule" of the natural harmonic series. It then developed into the music of the great epochs that created "rules" of composition which gradually disintegrated over centuries. The language of sound does not serve to communicate ideas as the language of words does, but rather musical language expresses feeling. All the rules of manipulating sound into music evaporate when melodies, harmonies and rhythmic time spring forth from the heart. When one appreciates music in this way, the idea that a composer is "stretching rules" becomes irrelevant. One does not think of "rules" when one listens to Debussy, one feels the music of moonlight or the fawn or the sea.
Languages have melodies and cadences so it makes natural sense that the melody and cadence of a composer's native language will inform the composer's aesthetics in writing music. This is not the only criterion but a pervasive one.
Two years later and no attention, i think your comment has a very imposing point. I study languages, and the " melodies & cadences of languages is foundational. I wonder if that could be one of the main determining factors in the nationality of different melodies.
Also great video! I love this kind of content. I’m always so curious as to what was inspiring Debussy when he created. It’s amazing and beautiful part of history
Great Music lesson. No wonder JAZZ is popular in France. Satie sounds like the Musical Grandad of Thelonious Monk (?). Bix Biederbeck used a whole-tone idea. Thank you for explaining where these sounds come from.
Debussy found inspiration in the far east, Japanese and Chinese music and aesthetics in particular. The minimalism, and wholistic philosophies that defined east asian art and aesthetics would go on to inspire impressionism, and by extension impressionist music. They also provided music without chromaticism, and interesting modal melodies, which were interpreted by impressionist composers. TLDR: France was the original Weeb.
This music is a great antidote to the disdain I feel for the characters in Guy de Maupassant's stories written in the same era. All is so lovely and soft in the music and paintings. I'd escape to the countryside or seaside or misty meadow too if the bourgeois citoyens are as disagreeable as those depicted by Maupassant.
Debussy certainly sounds French to me. I seem to hear the streets of Paris, with an accordion on the street corner, circa 1935, and, well, I'm not sure what else. This video is impressive. You explain more than I would have thought possible about the French sound -- which I think of as the sound of Paris.
Great video. About establishing tonality: you omitted Arcangelo Corelli. He was one of the pioneer in moving from modal to tonal but arguably the most succesful one in that new style. Bach studied Corelli. For you video you have probably gone too far in Germanophilia (said by someone who considers Beethoven the greatest composer ever)
...and then there are Belgian composers who are said to combine the best of both worlds😏😎✨ (French harmony but still sticking with Germanic structure where needed). PS: for the record I count Franck as *Belgian* 😜😛😛
I'm just wandering what you used to make a video like this, I have to do a research task and turn it into a video and thought that a video in this style would be great
Camille Saint-Saëns, Maurice Ravel and Hector Berlioz ... I think Paris, France has influenced music as it has style, language, poetry. You go to Paris and you are influenced.
As a Russian and a lover of late Russian classical music and literature I can’t fully agree with the parallel between Rachmaninov and Dostoyevsky, there definitely is a Deep relationship seen from the foreign eye, but the relevance triples and blooms if you compare Rachmaninov to Pasternak. You will literally hear Rachmaninov reading “Doctor Zhivago”. To me it’s not just minor or dark, it’s probably living on the edge or a marginal area and learning to love and sacrifice in the face of most tragic times. It’s a way of seeing a ray of light between the stormy clouds I guess, and it is transcendental (exceeding any life) channeled through Russians. It’s because they had to blend western and eastern cultures growing in between them for thousands of years.
Indeed, my music history teacher last year assigned me to write an paper about Debussy's connection to Symbolism, and how and why he wasn't an Impressionist.
I'm petty sure Picasso didn't want to be called an impressionist (or maybe he said this about cubism, I can't remember. You get the point though). Artists make the art. I don't think they really get to decide how they should be classified though
@@mattchu. Then that raises questions whether artists know themselves and their works. And again, doubts are raised whether critics know deeply what each characterism means. At least in my research I've found that Debussy was characterised as an Impressionist in his time, simply because "Impressionist" was the trendy term conservatives would apply to the progressive ones. (cf. also: doi.org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.07353 )
I think that music kept evolving and thus the feelings we all get when listening evolved as well. You can kinda feel the wind of change and progression in the artform when you hear something that sounds so modern but was made years and years ago.
Ravel used the Coltrane changes long before Coltrane was even born. Bach used harmony that wouldn’t bee seen again until Noel Rawsthorne. There’s always things hiding in classical music that you don’t expect to find there.
Yeah, but I don't really define extended harmony/chords as "jazz harmony" or "jazz chords". I know why they are often considered this way, but the definition of what jazz IS has everything to do with the COMBINATION of rhythmic syncopation/sometimes/often swung rhythms, improvisation sections, instrumentation, form and textures more unique to jazz music, and THEN the whole extended and/or (dep. on the piece) bluesy harmony kind of deal. And jazz isn't really supposed to be as "formal" as classical music. So its kind of like Venn diagrams, or bubbles. The bubble of extended tertial harmony overlaps with the bubble of jazz, but they are not quite the same thing...
Well, Bach was absolutely influenced by Italian style, as was usual in his time. In fact, before Bach, Italians and Frenchs dominated the European music scene
Yes, Corelli was in fact the one who made tonality popular. And he was the first one in having international success for instrumental music instead of vocal.
Yeah, the hyperboles said in the beginning of this video are way overblown and over the top. It's this sort of idolatry around composers that I dislike about the classical music fandom in general. For instance, Weber and Spohr should be more credited than Beethoven for bringing about Romantic chromaticism. Beethoven even criticized them for being too daring. He told Schindler that "Weber's Euryanthe is an accumulation of diminished sevenths; all little backdoors!" "Spohr is too rich in dissonances, and pleasure in his music is marred by chromatic harmony." Heck, Beethoven is even less chromatic than Mozart. Brahms said that "Dissonance, true dissonance as Mozart used it, is not to be found in Beethoven. Look at Idomeneo. Not only is it a marvel, but as Mozart was still quite young and brash when he wrote it, it was a completely new thing."
@@jackjack3320 Dissonance in Mozarts music is only used for expression ! Mozart is the supreme genius able to use musical tools ( dissonances, fugue, religious themes) for only ONE PURPOSE : EXPRESSION. Debussy doesnt use dissonances, he just makes a NEW language with them ! HUGE DIFFERENCE !
The first time I heard Debussy's music, I was 7 years old. A friend of mine gave me a cassette telling me "it is electronic Bach". I went home and my soul was absolutely trapped and mesmerized. When my mother -a social anthropologist - came home, I ran to her to showed my new musical discovery; she listened to the tape for a few seconds and told me: "that's not Bach... that's Debussy". it happened to be "Snowflakes are Dancing" a record made by the japanese genius, Isao Tomita, with electronic versions of some of Debussy's more popular compositions... since that day, I don't think I have let one week pass by without listening to Debussy: orchestral arrangements, solo piano versions... all of the available versions. I later became a musician myself (for 31 years now... uf!), and understood the revolutionary harmonic treatments of the French impressionists... I still say it is and will be my very favorite of them all.
I feel this is all very incomplete without the mention of Franz Liszt, a composer that pioneered many of the ideas of french impressionistic music in his last 20 years (well before Satie, mind you), and is well-documented to have been a major inspiration for composers such as Debussy and Ravel, that openly admired his work (and made references to it in their own). en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_works_of_Franz_Liszt Listen to the middle section, here, for example, 2:30 onward: ruclips.net/video/CWN18ZoqzGs/видео.html (Both Ravel and Debussy wrote their own Jeux D'eau, in reference to this piece)
Liszt certainly pioneered non-functional harmony. Where Beethoven pioneered the use of diminished modulation Liszt did the same with augmented modulation. He even wrote a "bagatelle sans tonalité". Liszt's water games at la Villa d'Este and even Chopin's barcarolle make use of colourful chord extensions (and not as suspensions) well before either of the composer's in this video.
To be honest folks, I think most people prefer the music of Debussy, etc. (also Satie somewhat, even) over Liszt. Its more of the reason why Liszt gets overlooked, time and time again, even though we all know his piano skill was unsurpassed in his day... Liszt fans are mostly pianists, and tend to be more focused around classical music. Oh sure, you get a few hard rock folks, etc., but not many, with Liszt. Debussy fans are into jazz, world music, easy listening, all KINDS of stuff outside of just classical music. Same deal with Satie (in the Debussy camp). 🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️
@@BenjaminGessel It’s the same reason why everyone prefers impressionist painting to romantic and realist art. There’s nothing disturbing in Monet’s art, nothing that requires any historical knowledge or political perspective. One never has to ask “What does this mean?”. No strife, no conflict, no unpleasant emotions, no connection to any particular time, nothing mysterious. This is why it is so easy for so many different people to enjoy his painting.
I believe a clue to Claude's uniqueness may be in spending his formative years in Russia studying Mussorgsky. He escaped the smothering dominance of Wagner. The older Saint Saens assumed the German school was the only path foreward. He coudn't 'get' Debussy. If you want some good chuckles from German love of polyphony versus French love of lyricism,read Strauss' commentary on Berlioz' Treatise On Instrumentation. Also,Mark DeVoto has a superb book out full of analysis of all of Debussy's major works. I found it very illuminating.
Could you possibly make a video on a breakdown of romantic Russian classical music...? Like the great romantic russian composers - Balakirev, "The five", Tchaikovsky, Glazunov, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff. whether it be their use of the Lithurgy from the Russian Orthodox church, russian folk songs, orientalism - what makes their melodies sound distinctly russian?
If you wanna talk about Balakirev and “the five”, you need to talk about Glinka. He largely inspired all of them and laid the foundation for Russian classical music.
And that's why they, especially Ravel, are my most beloved: The qualities that the composers influenced by germanic school have (the deep look into soul and sorrow) are things which a human being will face on earth often enough.
French music is great for this! But i feel like germanic music has a bit of a wrong/bad image in this regard. Not all germanic music is depressed, serious Beethoven/Wagner. It's just that these two are the poster children for it somehow... Haydn literally single-handedly invented the classical style of thematic variation, which is the foundation for literally everything composed after that. Listen to some Haydn Symphonies or piano sonatas. They are way lighter than Beethoven. I always feel like on a calm and sunny spring morning when listening to Haydn. Mozart too is very light-hearted.
"Johann Sebastian Bach defined the system of classical western tonality" Jean-Philippe Rameau, the French theorist and composer who ACTUALLY defined the system of classical western tonality: Am I a joke to you?
Yes but Rameau's treatise is markedly different from the voice-leading style of Bach. Rameau definitely important - but it is a more block chord way of thinking about music
Scarlatti, Handel, and Bach were all born in 1685. Vivaldi was born in 1678. Seems hard to believe that Bach invented the system. I'd always heard that Bach was not very well known in his day and not considered the dominant figure he is today, or was in the Romantic period. I never heard Bach called the father of harmony in music school. I suspect that misnomer may owe to his pedagogical value -- I imagine most modern harmony textbooks use his choral examples.
@@johnnidark6463 I would even go with voice-leading tonal system as far as Monteverdi to Palestrina to Josquin to Dunstable.. and so back to Machaut and Perotin... Frenchman again! :D
Well i'd say that the premise is wrong. Clearly french music sounds more like Debussy... I actually have an interesting idea... Two totally different styles can sound the same. Jazz and classical. How? Compare Debussy's Clair de Lune and Bix Beiderbecke's piano version of Flashes. You won't be able to say what is jazz and what ain't. Debussy and Satie are the reason why french later liked jazz so much and was the only country in europe fully open to accept jazz in its beginning. Then all the composers like Poulenc, Auric, Delerue came...
Chuis étonné que je peux comprendre qu'est-ce que vous dites. Je pense que je deviens meilleur à ecrire et lire français. Ecouter à parlance rapide, sur l'autre main...
Yes, so you should! 😊 Debussy has been my favourite since I was a young girl, and that was very many years ago. If I could play only his works on my piano, I would still be satisfied! I am also happy we share a birthday (August 22)
I teared up when you played Debussy’s Rêverie at 5:50. I poured my heart and soul into that song and I can now play it to the best of my ability. I truly did tear up when you put it on. Thank you
Do couperin sound french to you, Do Lully sound french, do pleyel sound french ? this is stupid, it's not because a type of music was pioneered by X country that this music has to represent this country. Scriabin, Rach, Prokofiev all same era are russian their music shouldn't be called russian but have another name reflecting their movement not their nationality.
Faure is also really french sounding but in a different way; his early and mid period works are firmly in the romantic vein, but his later works also take some (not all, the perfect cadence remained in his vocabulary but he made them weaker) of the features of impressionism, with weird voice leading, lack of resolution to dissonances, parallelism, wholetone scales. he did teach ravel, so there's an element of Faure being a precursor to this soundworld too. recommend listening to his later piano works and song cycles, and the piano trio and string quartet
Chopin had a large influence on Debussy and Ravel. Although obviously Mazurkas are Polish pastiche, really Chopin was instrumental in developing a French sound. He was based in Paris, lived in France most of his life and father was French. You can see the link with the French chanson, Chopin, Faure, Poulence, Debussy and Ravel. Debussy edited an edition of Chopin's Ballades.
Thank you so much. I am French Canadian, but that is not why I am writing to you. I have already listened to some of your videos and it touched me deeply. I even shed tears because you were able to express on several occasions how I feel deep inside about music. I wanted to comment earlier, but now I am taking the time to do so. Your passion for music without any arrogance is admirable. I am now subscribed to your channel. I'm less than an amateur, but I've been trying to compose for over a year. I would do this 48 hours a day! Thanks again!
Interestingly while influenced by Impressionism, and often called Impressionism in music, more and more I see these as connected to the Symbolist Movement. That languorous luxurious sound fits the world of Dorian Gray or Des Esseintes, with a trace of orchid and the strange paintings of Redon.
Yes I agree. Particularly Debussy. He was very interested in eastern philosophy. It is more about 'being in the moment' rather than classical development and resolution. Ravel was quite different; he was more a classicist particularly in regard to structure. He said his music was "pure Mozart". A lot of his pieces for example are in Sonata or rondo form.
@@simonjarvis6542 He was a great admirer of Turner. But his music does evoke imagery and he was happy with that observation. He objected to the use of the term Impressionism as it was then used. People now say that his stated aims are very similar to impressionist painters.
Fantastic video. Thank you. It's strange how the Debussy's radical (as perceived in the early 20th C) ideas and his influence on the development of modern "Classical" music has not perhaps been recognised to the same extent as the 2nd Viennese School. Yet his influence was profound (Ravel, Gershwin, early Bartok, Stravinsky, Messaien, De Falla etc. and some Jazz musicians such as Bill Evans and Eric Dolphy).As well as his novel use of harmony I think his (and Ravel's) timbral subtlety is influential particularly with the likes of Henri Dutilleux and the Spectralism composers. Wow; I've just listed many of my favourite composers,
If you want to understand these sounds, remember that melancholy and nostalgia are originally French words, while sorrow and anger are Germanic saxon words
I don't really agree with you when you say that the complex chords just aren't dissonant. I think they are dissonant, but that dissonance doesn't cause tension. Instead, it evokes color and emotion that consonance can't (or just doesn't in most cases)
I'm not so sure - it's redefining what a consonance is - in other words, notes that sound good together. This is something that's been redefined consistently in music history, and happened big time here. That is using standard definitions of dissonance and consonance. Major 7th chords, and 9th chords become the "default" consonance.
It doesn't make them less dissonant, it's using them as stable. If you establish a chord in a way that makes it sound unstable, then you resolve it. If it is established as stable, it isn't forced to go anywhere. For example, in "The Girl From Ipanema", the vamp uses a swaying between FΔ7 and GbΔ7. Both chords are the same quality, therefore same dissonance, but the FΔ7 is stable and the GbΔ7 is unstable and slides back down to the FΔ7. The FΔ7 is still dissonant, and we feel a bit of tension, but it comfortably sits there without needing to resolve to another chord because it has been established as stable.
Debussy’s use of whole tone scales, eastern influenced scales, and him and Ravel being French, and possibly frenemies, has made their particular style famous. Here’s something interesting, when most people hear Morriconne, an Italian, they think of American cowboys from his music composed for spaghetti westerns.
Great video! You did an amazing job explaining such complex and subtle pieces. I'd really enjoy watching more videos on early 20th century french composers. A video on Ravel would be great, as he was of course influenced by Debussy but also influenced him in return with pieces like Jeux d'eau (and also because he is my favourite composer ^^). There is so much to be said about his music, which varies from neo classicism (Pavane pour une infante défunte) and impressionism (Miroirs) to jazz (Piano concerto in G) and blues (Violin and Piano sonata no.2), and he would also be a good introduction to great orchestration!
I feel Liszt is missing here, first and foremost. He wrote the *first* Jeux D'eau, that inspired Ravel's, after all. His experimentation in his last years, in general, is known to have been a major and direct inspiration for impressionistic music. ruclips.net/video/CWN18ZoqzGs/видео.html
Aside from the jokes, there's nothing French about Debussy's music. Rather, the sound we associate with Debussy has come to be associated with French impressionism, but that's it.
I remember the first time I heard my brother play Debussy - I spent many nights pleading for him to play while I was falling asleep. It is the music of dreams. Nice video 🙏
I agree. It is dreamy. The blogger says the music is sad. I disagree. It isn't sad as say Chopin is. For me its very soothing and spiritually fulfilling.
I find it really interesting to connect Debussy to jazz. You talk about how consonance was re-defined and I think that is essential for jazz music as jazz uses almost every chord under the sun.
Would have been more interesting to explain _why_ these sound composers decided to compose like that. Specifically, as in, not just in opposition to the German model. Are there components of the language that could explain the melodic lines, the phrasing? Culturally, you mentioned a desire for beauty, what does that have to do with France? The language can be quite poetic and metaphorical/philosophical, is there a French sense of beauty that had to be expressed through music in a different way?
I watched a documentary once where they had people (from an African tribe with no musical tradition at all, if my memory serves me right) listen to classical pieces and samples of spoken European languages; they accurately related musical pieces to languages in a clear majority of cases.
One of the best feelings is when something is explained to you in a way that makes it seem so simple and obvious that you wonder why you didn't already know this before. Thank you for this video
Looking at the Monet paintings, I was reminded of the British Master J.M.W. Turner. He too reveled in indistinctness and the use of impressionistic imagery, particularly with light. Queen Victoria couldn't stand him. :)
One of the more interesting RUclips didactic musical posts. As you say yourself, one can not present everything in 17 minutes, but one may find some of the remarks simplistic, others unjustified and some important omissions. An enjoyable video and clear presentation. - Bach is not at the origin of major/minor tonality or the use of perfect cadences. Nor did he arrive in a sort of virgin birth. We know his important antecedents. - Does a perfect cadence need a dominant 7th? You have possibly treated the subject elsewhere, but one can't help feeling that the most important of its features is its conclusiveness, owing to the progression of the bass notes Dominant-Tonic. - I don't think you make mention of harmonic progression, only the traditional need to resolve tension. If the nature of a 9th or 13th chord is dissonant, the "sound" of Debussy is to be found partly in harmonic progression. - But also in his melodies, orchestration, as well as a French tendancy (which originated long before Debussy) to prefer repetition and variation to thematic and structural development. - Not much is taught in our universities and conservatoires of the harmonic system of Gabriel Fauré (Born some 17 years before Debussy) . He was simultaneously a French 'Institution', but also a sensitive musician whose works are too infrequently performed (apart from the ubiquitous Requiem and a few of his Mélodies). - I lost count of the times you associate "impressionistic" painting with music. It seems almost indoctrination. As if, for example 19th Century French authors and poets had not influenced composers. While Impressionism is generally taught to have been initiated on the Normandy coast, one should also look to John Turner's paintings and William Blake's coloured engravings. Was England too obsessed by nationalism to have many Impressionistic composers. - The final defeat of Napoléon Bonaparte by the Allied European Nations was a stunning blow to every single French Citizen. Humiliation. Poverty. An out-of-work army, a denial of France's capacity to be a Great Nation. That Prussia alone could again defeat the French in 1871 (as you mention) was yet another cruel blow to national pride. Loss of French territory in the East until 1918! Poets like Baudelaire worked in the mode "Spleen", a sadness generated by defeat. Composers sought refuge in the Bombastic Nationalism (Berlioz) or in writing light pieces for the theatre and opera. - Very good point that Wagner in his search for through-composed operas avoided the 'full stop' of perfect cadences in his mature works. - Robin Holloway's "Debussy and Wagner" publ. Eulenberg 1979 make a good case for the unexpected influence of the older composer on the younger. It is worth noting that Debussy attended the Bayreuth Festival with many of his young contemporaries, but later as music critic, Monsieur Croche) heavily criticised Wagner. - Lastly, in Debussy's day, the orchestra sounded differently! Not only were there gut strings, but a French harp, flute, saxophone, horn were not only made differently from their European rivals, but was played differently. French "sound" comes from this fact coupled with degree of vibrato, emphasis on the production of special registers (the lower octave of the flute for example). So you're quite right to want to amplify your remarks in other videos. Other questions are raised as riders. Does D. Scarlatti sound Italian? German? Spanish? Saint-Saëns and Magnard wrote some marvellous and well-structured symphonies. Do they sound French? German? Impressionistic? Romantic? Nationalist? Does Bach sound German ??? United Germany exists only since 1871. United Italy only since 1861. Could they be said to have composers with national sounds?
I am not very fond of impressionist music but there's something in the said style that leaves me breathless it might be because of the lack of a tinal center or it's just the "French-ness" of the music.
I've never understood what the word 'beauty' meant until it was noted, here, in Satie - and onward. Great scholarship... rare level of comprehension... First time I want to thank the presenter. Will watch the rest of your work analysis.
November 30, 2021. France's far-right political figure Eric Zemmour announced that he was running for the presidency. 2nd movement of Beethoven's 7th symphony, which was composed with a hatred towards the French during the Napoleonic Wars, was preferred as the background music. One of the most solid demonstration of the Germans' indisputable domination of music over any other nation.
You make some wonderful points. There is, however, a distinctly French aesthetic that predates both Satie and Debussy. It's in the spoken language, in the art (Boucher, Watteau)...in almost everything throughout France's history. You allude to the French emphasis on charm, and that's very important. There is also, in my view, a strong respect for humor in French music (Satie, Milhaud, Poulenc, Saint Saens). And, perhaps more than any of this, there is a certain detachment in French arts (visual, musical, literary, etc.). Even when Debussy's works are marked "sad" in the music (triste), it doesn't sound like Debussy's sadness. Instead, it sounds like the idea of sadness--as if sadness exists without someone to feel it. That detachment (when the work isn't about self expression, but wise observation) is--for me--the quality that allows all the other typically French qualities to live so vibrantly. Thank you for making a video about a subject I've thought abut my entire adult life.
Separating the feeling from the feeler seems to be a common them going forward in classical music from then on
But the ppl of Saties time hated his music so maybe not so french. I think most french sound is accordion musette.
Wow thank you for putting what I felt in words
@@maxalaintwo3578 I think with modern pop and even contemporary classical music is about expression and experiences
Thank you for making this comment, these were some fantastic observations that I agree with and there is a lot of evidence to back up what you are saying and where that may have emerged from. Feel free to keep in touch at theartismagistra@gmail.com as I'd like to access your commentary and ideas more regularly, and please let me know if you have written about these sorts of things more extensively anywhere, if not, feel free to write freely to me on any of these topics you may have thought about as you may feel like it, and to read these ideas would be an honor really and a great gift.
Some nice analysis here. Another French composer whose work shares some features with Satie and Debussy, yet who had her own distinct style, was Lili Boulanger. Some beautiful use of parallelism and ambiguous tonality in her work, as well as exquisite orchestration.
Talking about rule books, it was French composer Rameau the one who wrote the great harmony treatise focusing on the notion of "fundamental". Maybe the Germans were playing by the French rule book all along.
Hahaha true, true! To an extent. Rameau's treatise is quite different from the voice-leading style of Bach though, if you go through the rules he lays out
@@InsidetheScore But Bach's voice-leading style was 1) not the foundation for Haydn, Mozart Beethoven 2) dates back to late renaissance counterpoint: Palestrina of course and on the other route through Schütz and his huge influence on german protestant music back to Gabrieli and Lassus. And ultimately all that dates back to Josquin, Ockeghem, Du Fay... and from there to ars nova and ars antiqua, where we find French composers again.
Music history didn't start with Bach's generation, and what Bach did was in no way avantgarde or forward-looking in his time... he didn't do anything that composers before him didn't do already...
@@csabrendeki “What Bach did was in no way avant-garde or forward looking in his time” What a complete crock of shit
@@jasonschwartzmanstein9661 Bach was pretty conservative in his time. He wrote great music, but not avant-garde music. Telemann was more avant-garde as him. What I said is not about how good his music is, but how is it placed in his time.
Please, PLEASE, do a video on Prelude à laprès-midi d'un faune! It is an incredible piece with so much to uncover, to learn, and to experience. Its impact on the world of music cannot be understated, and would make for a perfect theme for one of your productions! Nonetheless, it is by far my favourite piece, and seeing you cover it in any way or form would be incredible!
Keep up your good work; your videos are works of art!
Yess pleasee!
“On those who overanalyze his music: When you tear the wings off a butterfly, it is no longer a butterfly.” - Debussy
There's a RUclips video of a lecture by Leonard Bernstein, called "The Delights and Dangers of Ambiguity," one of six lectures delivered at Harvard in the early 1970s. The final part of it is an analysis of the Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun. You might find that worth a look.
@@stravinskyfan but when you learn how to fly like the butterfly, on your instrument, you gain the ability to step into this world of music yourself. I want to understand how to play with chords and improvise as though I'm in the same place as these amazing peices. Such amazing beauty.
@@Luke-ji5ws then you should check out Nahre Sol's RUclips videos.
This is about as good an explanation of Debussy's "Franchiness" as one could make in 16 minutes -- historic, biographic, and analytic. Superb!
Debussy is my favorite composer of all, I think. I love playing his music, and listening to it. Thank you for this video!
Debussy and Satie should have been included in 'The Death of Melody' video for breaking the pattern of strong melodies.
I have realized that most of my favorite composers are French: Saint-Saëns, Berlioz, Fauré, Satie, Debussy. Maybe it's because I have been introduced to classical music with Le Carnaval des Animaux from Saint-Saëns and Le Boléro from Ravel? Éric Satie is an acquired taste though. When I was younger, I thought his Gymnopédie was boring. Now, I listen to it often. That and Gnossienne No1, one of his best, in my opinion.
Finally, avideo detailing the differences between French and German music, and easy to understamd. Many thanks!
Thank you, sir. Such a beautifully expressed and thoroughly researched topic. Well done.
this was great, I really appreciated it, as a self-taught adult student of the piano I'm always wondering what the theory is behind what I'm trying to play (I know how chords are named, and things like circle of fifths, II-V-I, etc) but what you explained is something I could not have figured out by myself, many, many thanks. I do hope you do more.
great video. enjoyed it greatly
Your channel deserves a lot more followers. Excellent job. Thank you!
thanks for this video, i would love to hear more analysis as this one
Thank you for this wonderful exposition on the artistic and political context of this revolutionary breaking of the “rules” of tonality. I am realizing that the French music profiled here predates the very earliest jazz music by a decade or so. The influence on the harmonic language of jazz must be huge. From a “dominant” chord being simply another chord, even the home chord, not requiring resolution, which is so essential to the tonality if the Blues. Then there is the complete parallelism of “planning” (such as Ellington’s The Mooche), chord extensions, the distinctive disorientation of the whole tone scale (which made it into the jazz language a bit later, notably with Monk). I’m sure it’s not a coincidence given the big cultural influence of French culture in New Orleans, birthplace of jazz. It was a former French territory after all (hence the name Louisiana), and French-speaking, classically trained creole musicians famously played a big part in the development of early jazz.
* “planing” (not “planning”) 😝
We called this "non goal-oriented".
Congratulations on 200,000 subscribers! Here’s to a million!
Wow. Music theory made clear. Thank you thank you.
Wow! Well done. This is one of the best videos on your channel. Bravo!
This video taught me concepts I didn't even know existed! I will keep an ear out for impressionistic style music.
Needs more accordion.
To most Americans, musette sounds more French than anything else.
@@claytonr.young-music912 *rest of the world
I believe fellow europeans must know more than Americans
@@claytonr.young-music912 who care of what americans think.
@@claytonr.young-music912 To me, Franck Angelis sounds french
Great video, thanks!
What a wonderful video. Thank you so much!
I am French, but it sounds to me as all that was already in Liszt's piano music (Années de Pélerinage, etc.)
So good for all skill levels. I have watched this video multiple times. Can you do an analysis of Images Set 2 no. 3 poisson d'or
I had the same question
Thank you
What characterizes French art, more than anything else, is "mannerism". Even in the most economical works, whether musical (Ravel and Debussy), architectural (Jean Nouvel) painterly (Ingres, Gauguin) or literary (Baudelaire, Hugo), the stroke has a shape to it, so one gets a sense that it was made by a human. In French we say "maniéré" and as in English, the root is the latin for "hand". Nothing specific about Debussy sounds French, your statement would only be true if you heard it for the first time, without knowing he was French. But in hindsight, there is this residual mannerism in his strokes that are common in French art.
Yes we all know that gothic is manierism !!! What a ridiculous comment !
Music as we know it in the West evolved from religious feeling that followed the "rule" of the natural harmonic series. It then developed into the music of the great epochs that created "rules" of composition which gradually disintegrated over centuries. The language of sound does not serve to communicate ideas as the language of words does, but rather musical language expresses feeling. All the rules of manipulating sound into music evaporate when melodies, harmonies and rhythmic time spring forth from the heart. When one appreciates music in this way, the idea that a composer is "stretching rules" becomes irrelevant. One does not think of "rules" when one listens to Debussy, one feels the music of moonlight or the fawn or the sea.
Brilliant demonstration
Languages have melodies and cadences so it makes natural sense that the melody and cadence of a composer's native language will inform the composer's aesthetics in writing music. This is not the only criterion but a pervasive one.
Two years later and no attention, i think your comment has a very imposing point. I study languages, and the " melodies & cadences of languages is foundational. I wonder if that could be one of the main determining factors in the nationality of different melodies.
Wow that is impressive. Thank you very much!
It's really cool to see that you hear Debussy as "french sound". I see it as beach music or ocean music even nature music or light music.
More please. Cant get enough
Also great video! I love this kind of content. I’m always so curious as to what was inspiring Debussy when he created. It’s amazing and beautiful part of history
Great Music lesson. No wonder JAZZ is popular in France. Satie sounds like the Musical Grandad of Thelonious Monk (?). Bix Biederbeck used a whole-tone idea. Thank you for explaining where these sounds come from.
"Just listen to the beginning:"
Debussy found inspiration in the far east, Japanese and Chinese music and aesthetics in particular. The minimalism, and wholistic philosophies that defined east asian art and aesthetics would go on to inspire impressionism, and by extension impressionist music. They also provided music without chromaticism, and interesting modal melodies, which were interpreted by impressionist composers.
TLDR: France was the original Weeb.
Yes, the Paris exhibition (can't remember the year) when the Gamalan were played, influenced many contemporary composers.
Thanks for telling the songs in description i just learned reflets dans l'eau😅
7:27 HAHA!
A similar video on Ravel or Gershwin would be awesome.
This music is a great antidote to the disdain I feel for the characters in Guy de Maupassant's stories written in the same era. All is so lovely and soft in the music and paintings. I'd escape to the countryside or seaside or misty meadow too if the bourgeois citoyens are as disagreeable as those depicted by Maupassant.
Debussy certainly sounds French to me.
I seem to hear the streets of Paris, with an accordion on the street corner, circa 1935, and, well, I'm not sure what else.
This video is impressive.
You explain more than I would have thought possible about the French sound -- which I think of as the sound of Paris.
The titles were also taken from poets such as Baudelaire
cool.
So basically, the French invented jazz
L'art pour l'art
Is there still tonality in Debussy's music? Like when he was writing a piece made up of whole step notes?
Great video. About establishing tonality: you omitted Arcangelo Corelli. He was one of the pioneer in moving from modal to tonal but arguably the most succesful one in that new style. Bach studied Corelli. For you video you have probably gone too far in Germanophilia (said by someone who considers Beethoven the greatest composer ever)
...and then there are Belgian composers who are said to combine the best of both worlds😏😎✨ (French harmony but still sticking with Germanic structure where needed).
PS: for the record I count Franck as *Belgian* 😜😛😛
I'm just wandering what you used to make a video like this, I have to do a research task and turn it into a video and thought that a video in this style would be great
That "Richard Wagner" pronunciation is a punishment for his life views or what? :)
I don't follow. What'd he do wrong? Not pronounce Richard like "Rikart" or something?
@@maxalaintwo3578 Just search on RUclips "how to pronunciate Richard Wagner", there are many clips just for that.
Camille Saint-Saëns, Maurice Ravel and Hector Berlioz ... I think Paris, France has influenced music as it has style, language, poetry. You go to Paris and you are influenced.
If Debussy sounds like a Monet painting, why does Rachmaninov or Prokofiev sound like Dostoyevsky Novels ?
Maybe because russian pieces are often in minor keys which makes them sound heavier and more dramatic
As a Russian and a lover of late Russian classical music and literature I can’t fully agree with the parallel between Rachmaninov and Dostoyevsky, there definitely is a Deep relationship seen from the foreign eye, but the relevance triples and blooms if you compare Rachmaninov to Pasternak. You will literally hear Rachmaninov reading “Doctor Zhivago”. To me it’s not just minor or dark, it’s probably living on the edge or a marginal area and learning to love and sacrifice in the face of most tragic times. It’s a way of seeing a ray of light between the stormy clouds I guess, and it is transcendental (exceeding any life) channeled through Russians. It’s because they had to blend western and eastern cultures growing in between them for thousands of years.
Yes!
LOL maybe because there aren’t paintings by Dostojevski
Debussy doesn't sound French. There's literally not one single accordion in any of his pieces.
yes yes make your baguette jokes.
@@maxalaintwo3578 loooool
@Camarade Toff And German lol
@Camarade Toff do you wear a stripey t shirt, like Debussy
@Camarade Toff so no onions round the neck then? You disappoint me (he said removing his bowler hat)
And yet Debussy rejected the idea that he was impressionistic. He didn't want to be called impressionist
As much as Philip glass who writes minimalist music doesn't want to be called a minimalist, and here we are
Impressionist used to be a term of derision by the French academies
Indeed, my music history teacher last year assigned me to write an paper about Debussy's connection to Symbolism, and how and why he wasn't an Impressionist.
I'm petty sure Picasso didn't want to be called an impressionist (or maybe he said this about cubism, I can't remember. You get the point though). Artists make the art. I don't think they really get to decide how they should be classified though
@@mattchu. Then that raises questions whether artists know themselves and their works. And again, doubts are raised whether critics know deeply what each characterism means. At least in my research I've found that Debussy was characterised as an Impressionist in his time, simply because "Impressionist" was the trendy term conservatives would apply to the progressive ones. (cf. also: doi.org/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.07353 )
It's amazing how Satie played what we now know as Jazz chords back in the 19th century.
Jazz is one of the greatest invention in modern music.
Beethoven liked a bit of boogy-woogie too.
I think that music kept evolving and thus the feelings we all get when listening evolved as well. You can kinda feel the wind of change and progression in the artform when you hear something that sounds so modern but was made years and years ago.
Ravel used the Coltrane changes long before Coltrane was even born. Bach used harmony that wouldn’t bee seen again until Noel Rawsthorne. There’s always things hiding in classical music that you don’t expect to find there.
Yeah, but I don't really define extended harmony/chords as "jazz harmony" or "jazz chords". I know why they are often considered this way, but the definition of what jazz IS has everything to do with the COMBINATION of rhythmic syncopation/sometimes/often swung rhythms, improvisation sections, instrumentation, form and textures more unique to jazz music, and THEN the whole extended and/or (dep. on the piece) bluesy harmony kind of deal. And jazz isn't really supposed to be as "formal" as classical music.
So its kind of like Venn diagrams, or bubbles. The bubble of extended tertial harmony overlaps with the bubble of jazz, but they are not quite the same thing...
Well, Bach was absolutely influenced by Italian style, as was usual in his time. In fact, before Bach, Italians and Frenchs dominated the European music scene
Yes, Corelli was in fact the one who made tonality popular. And he was the first one in having international success for instrumental music instead of vocal.
Yeah, the hyperboles said in the beginning of this video are way overblown and over the top. It's this sort of idolatry around composers that I dislike about the classical music fandom in general. For instance, Weber and Spohr should be more credited than Beethoven for bringing about Romantic chromaticism. Beethoven even criticized them for being too daring. He told Schindler that "Weber's Euryanthe is an accumulation of diminished sevenths; all little backdoors!" "Spohr is too rich in dissonances, and pleasure in his music is marred by chromatic harmony." Heck, Beethoven is even less chromatic than Mozart. Brahms said that "Dissonance, true dissonance as Mozart used it, is not to be found in Beethoven. Look at Idomeneo. Not only is it a marvel, but as Mozart was still quite young and brash when he wrote it, it was a completely new thing."
@@jackjack3320 Dissonance in Mozarts music is only used for expression ! Mozart is the supreme genius able to use musical tools ( dissonances, fugue, religious themes) for only ONE PURPOSE : EXPRESSION. Debussy doesnt use dissonances, he just makes a NEW language with them ! HUGE DIFFERENCE !
more so English style
I feel Erik Satie is the more French-sound one of them.
Thank you.
@@eriksatieofficiel yo Erik when your new track comin out??
ravel is too
Satie is French, Debussy is French + Asian - kind of, and Ravel is Spanish (Basque) + Swiss. 😁😁😁
@@BenjaminGessel Asian?
When Debussy took conservatory exams the big criticism against him was "he doesn't even sound French". That seems ridiculous now.
But it's true, he doesn't sound French at all. Debussy sounds like Debussy, that's it.
Or maybe the only thing ridiculous is to say that something sounds French.
I don’t know if Debussy sounds as french as Louis Vierne or César Franck. Debussy sounds very much, like Debussy.
The first time I heard Debussy's music, I was 7 years old. A friend of mine gave me a cassette telling me "it is electronic Bach". I went home and my soul was absolutely trapped and mesmerized. When my mother -a social anthropologist - came home, I ran to her to showed my new musical discovery; she listened to the tape for a few seconds and told me: "that's not Bach... that's Debussy". it happened to be "Snowflakes are Dancing" a record made by the japanese genius, Isao Tomita, with electronic versions of some of Debussy's more popular compositions... since that day, I don't think I have let one week pass by without listening to Debussy: orchestral arrangements, solo piano versions... all of the available versions. I later became a musician myself (for 31 years now... uf!), and understood the revolutionary harmonic treatments of the French impressionists... I still say it is and will be my very favorite of them all.
Not sure why, but I wonder if you have heard the Jacques Lussier versions of Bach. Perhaps you'd enjoy them
Tomita was the goat man god bless him 🙏
I feel this is all very incomplete without the mention of Franz Liszt, a composer that pioneered many of the ideas of french impressionistic music in his last 20 years (well before Satie, mind you), and is well-documented to have been a major inspiration for composers such as Debussy and Ravel, that openly admired his work (and made references to it in their own).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_works_of_Franz_Liszt
Listen to the middle section, here, for example, 2:30 onward: ruclips.net/video/CWN18ZoqzGs/видео.html
(Both Ravel and Debussy wrote their own Jeux D'eau, in reference to this piece)
He deserves his own feature-lengths documentary. What a character
Liszt certainly pioneered non-functional harmony. Where Beethoven pioneered the use of diminished modulation Liszt did the same with augmented modulation. He even wrote a "bagatelle sans tonalité". Liszt's water games at la Villa d'Este and even Chopin's barcarolle make use of colourful chord extensions (and not as suspensions) well before either of the composer's in this video.
To be honest folks, I think most people prefer the music of Debussy, etc. (also Satie somewhat, even) over Liszt. Its more of the reason why Liszt gets overlooked, time and time again, even though we all know his piano skill was unsurpassed in his day...
Liszt fans are mostly pianists, and tend to be more focused around classical music. Oh sure, you get a few hard rock folks, etc., but not many, with Liszt.
Debussy fans are into jazz, world music, easy listening, all KINDS of stuff outside of just classical music. Same deal with Satie (in the Debussy camp).
🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️
@@BenjaminGessel It’s the same reason why everyone prefers impressionist painting to romantic and realist art. There’s nothing disturbing in Monet’s art, nothing that requires any historical knowledge or political perspective. One never has to ask “What does this mean?”. No strife, no conflict, no unpleasant emotions, no connection to any particular time, nothing mysterious. This is why it is so easy for so many different people to enjoy his painting.
@@geneklee7608 😊😊😊👌👌👌👌
I believe a clue to Claude's uniqueness may be in spending his formative years in Russia studying Mussorgsky. He escaped the smothering dominance of Wagner. The older Saint Saens assumed the German school was the only path foreward. He coudn't 'get' Debussy. If you want some good chuckles from German love of polyphony versus French love of lyricism,read Strauss' commentary on Berlioz' Treatise On Instrumentation. Also,Mark DeVoto has a superb book out full of analysis of all of Debussy's major works. I found it very illuminating.
Mark DeVoto,"Debussy And The Veil Of Tonality"
I am unable to comprehend how anyone can like Wagner.
Although Wagner is phenomenal
Could you possibly make a video on a breakdown of romantic Russian classical music...? Like the great romantic russian composers - Balakirev, "The five", Tchaikovsky, Glazunov, Scriabin, Rachmaninoff. whether it be their use of the Lithurgy from the Russian Orthodox church, russian folk songs, orientalism - what makes their melodies sound distinctly russian?
I would really love that too!
If you wanna talk about Balakirev and “the five”, you need to talk about Glinka. He largely inspired all of them and laid the foundation for Russian classical music.
Medtner too and feinberg
@@jamesongaertner9416 oh i mean glinka and "the five" i always get him and balakirev mixed up xD
And that's why they, especially Ravel, are my most beloved: The qualities that the composers influenced by germanic school have (the deep look into soul and sorrow) are things which a human being will face on earth often enough.
same! my escapism really showed… 😂
Same here, I’ve always loved the French style more than the Germanic style
French music is great for this! But i feel like germanic music has a bit of a wrong/bad image in this regard. Not all germanic music is depressed, serious Beethoven/Wagner. It's just that these two are the poster children for it somehow...
Haydn literally single-handedly invented the classical style of thematic variation, which is the foundation for literally everything composed after that. Listen to some Haydn Symphonies or piano sonatas. They are way lighter than Beethoven. I always feel like on a calm and sunny spring morning when listening to Haydn. Mozart too is very light-hearted.
What makes Debussy sound French?
I mean, he is French.
(ok, ok, I'll take my leave)
"Germanic composers were the rule-makers"
Palestrina: Am I a joke to you?
Well yes I was talking post-Bach
xD I've studied his music and it's ridiculous how strict it is but yet it sounds so good.
@@AEPMUSlC I think one day Palestrina will be really discovered and become something of a sensation.
"Johann Sebastian Bach defined the system of classical western tonality"
Jean-Philippe Rameau, the French theorist and composer who ACTUALLY defined the system of classical western tonality: Am I a joke to you?
Yes but Rameau's treatise is markedly different from the voice-leading style of Bach. Rameau definitely important - but it is a more block chord way of thinking about music
@@InsidetheScore Bach's voice-leading functional-harmony tonal system had been established well before him; see Arcangelo Corelli.
Scarlatti, Handel, and Bach were all born in 1685. Vivaldi was born in 1678. Seems hard to believe that Bach invented the system. I'd always heard that Bach was not very well known in his day and not considered the dominant figure he is today, or was in the Romantic period. I never heard Bach called the father of harmony in music school. I suspect that misnomer may owe to his pedagogical value -- I imagine most modern harmony textbooks use his choral examples.
@@johnnidark6463 I would even go with voice-leading tonal system as far as Monteverdi to Palestrina to Josquin to Dunstable.. and so back to Machaut and Perotin... Frenchman again! :D
@@csabrendeki thanks for the suggestions !
No piece sounds more french than Erik Satie’s Je Te Veux
A lot of music sounds more french when you know more french music
You are right my friend.
@@carlovazquez1586
Thanks for disqualifying my opinion with a condescendingly shit remark. Makes you look like a right arse.
@@FreakieFan stfu
@@FreakieFan And your response of his comment makes you look insecure and even more of an arse.
Well i'd say that the premise is wrong. Clearly french music sounds more like Debussy... I actually have an interesting idea... Two totally different styles can sound the same. Jazz and classical. How? Compare Debussy's Clair de Lune and Bix Beiderbecke's piano version of Flashes. You won't be able to say what is jazz and what ain't. Debussy and Satie are the reason why french later liked jazz so much and was the only country in europe fully open to accept jazz in its beginning. Then all the composers like Poulenc, Auric, Delerue came...
Jazz is a great invention !
Nice! I'd love a "what makes Isaac Albéniz sound Spanish" video.
Je suis tellement fière d'être française quand j'entends les merveilleuses oeuvres de Debussy !
Chuis étonné que je peux comprendre qu'est-ce que vous dites. Je pense que je deviens meilleur à ecrire et lire français. Ecouter à parlance rapide, sur l'autre main...
@aSCent_ICO 🤣 ce troll
@aSCent_ICO non
Et moi je suis fier d'être français quand je vois ce commentaire :)
Yes, so you should! 😊 Debussy has been my favourite since I was a young girl, and that was very many years ago. If I could play only his works on my piano, I would still be satisfied! I am also happy we share a birthday (August 22)
I teared up when you played Debussy’s Rêverie at 5:50. I poured my heart and soul into that song and I can now play it to the best of my ability. I truly did tear up when you put it on. Thank you
French music sounds a bit sad like a rainy afternoon on a weekend when you had plans to go out but the rain spoiled it.
That's weather in France most of the time.
It sounds lush and natural, with a hint of melancholy
@@Pfsif wtf? South of France is very sunny. There are many climates in France.
Les Feuilles Mortes supports your thesis. So many French songs use the same chord progression.
@@l-esprit_de_l-ouest Is the French equivalent of "wtf" written "cqcb"?
Do couperin sound french to you, Do Lully sound french, do pleyel sound french ?
this is stupid, it's not because a type of music was pioneered by X country that this music has to represent this country. Scriabin, Rach, Prokofiev all same era are russian their music shouldn't be called russian but have another name reflecting their movement not their nationality.
7:30 lmao what is this parallel
Faure is also really french sounding but in a different way; his early and mid period works are firmly in the romantic vein, but his later works also take some (not all, the perfect cadence remained in his vocabulary but he made them weaker) of the features of impressionism, with weird voice leading, lack of resolution to dissonances, parallelism, wholetone scales. he did teach ravel, so there's an element of Faure being a precursor to this soundworld too. recommend listening to his later piano works and song cycles, and the piano trio and string quartet
Chopin had a large influence on Debussy and Ravel. Although obviously Mazurkas are Polish pastiche, really Chopin was instrumental in developing a French sound. He was based in Paris, lived in France most of his life and father was French. You can see the link with the French chanson, Chopin, Faure, Poulence, Debussy and Ravel. Debussy edited an edition of Chopin's Ballades.
Thank you so much. I am French Canadian, but that is not why I am writing to you. I have already listened to some of your videos and it touched me deeply. I even shed tears because you were able to express on several occasions how I feel deep inside about music. I wanted to comment earlier, but now I am taking the time to do so. Your passion for music without any arrogance is admirable. I am now subscribed to your channel. I'm less than an amateur, but I've been trying to compose for over a year. I would do this 48 hours a day! Thanks again!
Interestingly while influenced by Impressionism, and often called Impressionism in music, more and more I see these as connected to the Symbolist Movement. That languorous luxurious sound fits the world of Dorian Gray or Des Esseintes, with a trace of orchid and the strange paintings of Redon.
I tend to agree. Also I believe Debussy did not like being compared to the Impressionist painters.
Thank you! I was looking for the "Debussy was a symbolist, not impressionist" comments
Yes I agree. Particularly Debussy. He was very interested in eastern philosophy. It is more about 'being in the moment' rather than classical development and resolution. Ravel was quite different; he was more a classicist particularly in regard to structure. He said his music was "pure Mozart". A lot of his pieces for example are in Sonata or rondo form.
@@simonjarvis6542 He was a great admirer of Turner. But his music does evoke imagery and he was happy with that observation. He objected to the use of the term Impressionism as it was then used. People now say that his stated aims are very similar to impressionist painters.
Fantastic video. Thank you. It's strange how the Debussy's radical (as perceived in the early 20th C) ideas and his influence on the development of modern "Classical" music has not perhaps been recognised to the same extent as the 2nd Viennese School. Yet his influence was profound (Ravel, Gershwin, early Bartok, Stravinsky, Messaien, De Falla etc. and some Jazz musicians such as Bill Evans and Eric Dolphy).As well as his novel use of harmony I think his (and Ravel's) timbral subtlety is influential particularly with the likes of Henri Dutilleux and the Spectralism composers. Wow; I've just listed many of my favourite composers,
If you want to understand these sounds, remember that melancholy and nostalgia are originally French words, while sorrow and anger are Germanic saxon words
Storm und Drang
Well there is an equivalent of sorrow and anger on French too but I see the point
melancholy and nostalgia are Greek words.
@@reellezahl Greeings reelle Zahl, fancy meeting you here :) Indeed.
I don't really agree with you when you say that the complex chords just aren't dissonant. I think they are dissonant, but that dissonance doesn't cause tension. Instead, it evokes color and emotion that consonance can't (or just doesn't in most cases)
I'm not so sure - it's redefining what a consonance is - in other words, notes that sound good together. This is something that's been redefined consistently in music history, and happened big time here. That is using standard definitions of dissonance and consonance. Major 7th chords, and 9th chords become the "default" consonance.
It doesn't make them less dissonant, it's using them as stable. If you establish a chord in a way that makes it sound unstable, then you resolve it. If it is established as stable, it isn't forced to go anywhere. For example, in "The Girl From Ipanema", the vamp uses a swaying between FΔ7 and GbΔ7. Both chords are the same quality, therefore same dissonance, but the FΔ7 is stable and the GbΔ7 is unstable and slides back down to the FΔ7. The FΔ7 is still dissonant, and we feel a bit of tension, but it comfortably sits there without needing to resolve to another chord because it has been established as stable.
Dissonance is as dissonance does. It's all in the treatment, in the application and in what surrounds the harmony that could be considered dissonant.
The short answer :
The Classe à la Française
Debussy wrote in 1893 "Chabrier, Moussorgsky, Palestrina, voilà ce que j'aime" - they are what I love.
Debussy’s use of whole tone scales, eastern influenced scales, and him and Ravel being French, and possibly frenemies, has made their particular style famous. Here’s something interesting, when most people hear Morriconne, an Italian, they think of American cowboys from his music composed for spaghetti westerns.
Great video! You did an amazing job explaining such complex and subtle pieces. I'd really enjoy watching more videos on early 20th century french composers. A video on Ravel would be great, as he was of course influenced by Debussy but also influenced him in return with pieces like Jeux d'eau (and also because he is my favourite composer ^^). There is so much to be said about his music, which varies from neo classicism (Pavane pour une infante défunte) and impressionism (Miroirs) to jazz (Piano concerto in G) and blues (Violin and Piano sonata no.2), and he would also be a good introduction to great orchestration!
I feel Liszt is missing here, first and foremost. He wrote the *first* Jeux D'eau, that inspired Ravel's, after all. His experimentation in his last years, in general, is known to have been a major and direct inspiration for impressionistic music. ruclips.net/video/CWN18ZoqzGs/видео.html
The titles of the Debussy's Preludes are a setting for an amazing atmosphere.
Debussy makes me think of Marcel Proust.
Aside from the jokes, there's nothing French about Debussy's music. Rather, the sound we associate with Debussy has come to be associated with French impressionism, but that's it.
I remember the first time I heard my brother play Debussy - I spent many nights pleading for him to play while I was falling asleep. It is the music of dreams. Nice video 🙏
🎶💤
I agree. It is dreamy. The blogger says the music is sad. I disagree. It isn't sad as say Chopin is. For me its very soothing and spiritually fulfilling.
I find it really interesting to connect Debussy to jazz. You talk about how consonance was re-defined and I think that is essential for jazz music as jazz uses almost every chord under the sun.
yeah debussy was a fucking jazzman he didn't give a fuck about using original chords
Satie saranbandes definitely sound like jazz to me
So this is what french sounds like, huh...
If you listen closely you can hear the faint hons hons hons baguette baguette
Would have been more interesting to explain _why_ these sound composers decided to compose like that. Specifically, as in, not just in opposition to the German model.
Are there components of the language that could explain the melodic lines, the phrasing? Culturally, you mentioned a desire for beauty, what does that have to do with France? The language can be quite poetic and metaphorical/philosophical, is there a French sense of beauty that had to be expressed through music in a different way?
I watched a documentary once where they had people (from an African tribe with no musical tradition at all, if my memory serves me right) listen to classical pieces and samples of spoken European languages; they accurately related musical pieces to languages in a clear majority of cases.
One of the best feelings is when something is explained to you in a way that makes it seem so simple and obvious that you wonder why you didn't already know this before. Thank you for this video
I thought Rameau got some credit for the theoretical framework of French music.
Answer: Only if you associate music with countries
It’s impressionistic, not French
Looking at the Monet paintings, I was reminded of the British Master J.M.W. Turner. He too reveled in indistinctness and the use of impressionistic imagery, particularly with light. Queen Victoria couldn't stand him. :)
any music or thing based on image and somehow lighthearted will be french. But remember that Ravel is the guy, Debussy is like drugs, just on friday.
One of the more interesting RUclips didactic musical posts.
As you say yourself, one can not present everything in 17 minutes, but one may find some of the remarks simplistic, others unjustified and some important omissions.
An enjoyable video and clear presentation.
- Bach is not at the origin of major/minor tonality or the use of perfect cadences. Nor did he arrive in a sort of virgin birth. We know his important antecedents.
- Does a perfect cadence need a dominant 7th? You have possibly treated the subject elsewhere, but one can't help feeling that the most important of its features is its conclusiveness, owing to the progression of the bass notes Dominant-Tonic.
- I don't think you make mention of harmonic progression, only the traditional need to resolve tension. If the nature of a 9th or 13th chord is dissonant, the "sound" of Debussy is to be found partly in harmonic progression.
- But also in his melodies, orchestration, as well as a French tendancy (which originated long before Debussy) to prefer repetition and variation to thematic and structural development.
- Not much is taught in our universities and conservatoires of the harmonic system of Gabriel Fauré (Born some 17 years before Debussy) . He was simultaneously a French 'Institution', but also a sensitive musician whose works are too infrequently performed (apart from the ubiquitous Requiem and a few of his Mélodies).
- I lost count of the times you associate "impressionistic" painting with music. It seems almost indoctrination. As if, for example 19th Century French authors and poets had not influenced composers. While Impressionism is generally taught to have been initiated on the Normandy coast, one should also look to John Turner's paintings and William Blake's coloured engravings. Was England too obsessed by nationalism to have many Impressionistic composers.
- The final defeat of Napoléon Bonaparte by the Allied European Nations was a stunning blow to every single French Citizen. Humiliation. Poverty. An out-of-work army, a denial of France's capacity to be a Great Nation. That Prussia alone could again defeat the French in 1871 (as you mention) was yet another cruel blow to national pride. Loss of French territory in the East until 1918!
Poets like Baudelaire worked in the mode "Spleen", a sadness generated by defeat. Composers sought refuge in the Bombastic Nationalism (Berlioz) or in writing light pieces for the theatre and opera.
- Very good point that Wagner in his search for through-composed operas avoided the 'full stop' of perfect cadences in his mature works.
- Robin Holloway's "Debussy and Wagner" publ. Eulenberg 1979 make a good case for the unexpected influence of the older composer on the younger. It is worth noting that Debussy attended the Bayreuth Festival with many of his young contemporaries, but later as music critic, Monsieur Croche) heavily criticised Wagner.
- Lastly, in Debussy's day, the orchestra sounded differently! Not only were there gut strings, but a French harp, flute, saxophone, horn were not only made differently from their European rivals, but was played differently. French "sound" comes from this fact coupled with degree of vibrato, emphasis on the production of special registers (the lower octave of the flute for example).
So you're quite right to want to amplify your remarks in other videos.
Other questions are raised as riders.
Does D. Scarlatti sound Italian? German? Spanish?
Saint-Saëns and Magnard wrote some marvellous and well-structured symphonies. Do they sound French? German? Impressionistic? Romantic? Nationalist?
Does Bach sound German ???
United Germany exists only since 1871. United Italy only since 1861. Could they be said to have composers with national sounds?
I am not very fond of impressionist music but there's something in the said style that leaves me breathless it might be because of the lack of a tinal center or it's just the "French-ness" of the music.
I've never understood what the word 'beauty' meant until it was noted, here, in Satie - and onward. Great scholarship... rare level of comprehension... First time I want to thank the presenter. Will watch the rest of your work analysis.
November 30, 2021. France's far-right political figure Eric Zemmour announced that he was running for the presidency. 2nd movement of Beethoven's 7th symphony, which was composed with a hatred towards the French during the Napoleonic Wars, was preferred as the background music. One of the most solid demonstration of the Germans' indisputable domination of music over any other nation.