“Truth without authenticity”: that’s how Spanish composer Manuel de Falla praised “Soirée dans Grenade,” a piano piece by his French contemporary, Claude Debussy (1862–1918). At the time, Falla was writing about the “visionary genius” that gave Debussy—who in fact spent only a few hours in Spain in his entire life—the ability to summon up the spirit of Andalusia without falling back on the kind of folk-music cliches that circulated widely at the time. But his remark applies to Debussy’s music more profoundly and more generally. Debussy was, for the most part, a descriptive ...

“Truth without authenticity”: that’s how Spanish composer Manuel de Falla praised “Soirée dans Grenade,” a piano piece by his French contemporary, Claude Debussy (1862–1918). At the time, Falla was writing about the “visionary genius” that gave Debussy—who in fact spent only a few hours in Spain in his entire life—the ability to summon up the spirit of Andalusia without falling back on the kind of folk-music cliches that circulated widely at the time. But his remark applies to Debussy’s music more profoundly and more generally. Debussy was, for the most part, a descriptive composer; but even his most picturesque music differs profoundly from that of previous descriptive composers. It doesn’t aim to convey the character of the external world itself (he despised the nature-painting of Beethoven’s Pastorale Symphony); rather, it reflects what he called his “inner landscape”—the impressions of the world as recalled or imagined.

Thus, Debussy (in rather cryptic prose) described tonight’s offering, his Three Nocturnes (1897–99), as follows [my translation]:

“Nuages” (Clouds): This is the immutable aspect of the sky and the slow, melancholy march of the clouds, ending up in a gray agony gently tinted with white.

“Fêtes” (Festivals): This is movement, the dancing rhythm of the atmosphere with abrupt flashes of light. There is also the episode of a procession (a blazing and chimerical vision) that passes through the festive scene and becomes merged with it; but the background remains, fixedly and forever, the festival and its mixture of music and luminous dust joining in a universal rhythm.

“Sirènes” (Sirens)”: This is the sea with its infinite rhythms and then, amid the waves silvered by the moonlight, the mysterious song of the Sirens is heard, laughing and passing away.

Clearly, he’s evoking three scenes. But what kind of scenes? Clouds ending up in “gray agony”? The “dancing rhythm of the atmosphere”? A “chimerical vision”? These are not precise reflections of reality like those we heard in Vivaldi’s Four Seasons on our last Masterworks concert. Rather, they are dream images or memories of impressions created by that reality— filtered and enhanced, it would seem, by his experience with the painting, poetry, and music of his time.

Debussy writes some of the most gorgeous, most sensual music in the repertoire. But it’s never merely pretty. The sirens may have been beautiful, but their singing lured sailors to their deaths; and in retrospect (an appropriate way to think of Debussy’s music), the earlier two pieces have their darker implications, too. Nor, for that matter, is his music conventional. Although by now his style has become familiar, it was revolutionary in outlook at the time he composed it. In terms of color, his phrase about the clouds—“ending up in a gray agony gently tinted with white”—gives some sense of the subtlety of his use of the orchestra. But it’s his use of harmony that’s most striking. The standard Austro-German works of the 19th century were based on what was called “functional harmony.” This is a system in which each chord served a specific purpose, a system of dissonance and resolution that generated a sense of musical progression and closure. Especially in “Nuages,” Debussy often moved away functional harmony, ready to treat chords for their immediate, even static, sensuous appeal, rather than for their contribution to musical sequence. As conductor Larry Loh puts it, the music’s tonal centers “float around, making the listener feel uncertain about where the ground is.”

Debussy resisted the profligate orchestration favored by Wagner and Mahler, only using what was necessary. In this case, however, he felt that something extra was required, and he added a women’s chorus to “Sirènes.” Not surprisingly, though, he uses it in a special way, “as a color” in Larry’s terms, “bringing a human sound into the orchestra.” Because of the added difficulty of bringing in the singers, the first two Nocturnes are often performed without “Sirènes”; full performances, like tonight’s, are moderately rare. But when you hear the sounds that Debussy created, you’ll understand why he made the choice he did.

There’s also a women’s chorus in the other-worldly Neptune, which concludes The Planets (1914–1916) by Gustav Holst (1874–1934). The effect, though, is quite unlike that in Sirènes: icy and distant (Holst’s singers are off stage) rather than immediate and seductive. (Holst heightens the sense of distance by having the singers alone at the end, and having the door between them and the stage slowly close as they repeat the final measure “until the sound is lost in the distance.”) More generally, while The Planets is notable, too, for its ingenious use of orchestral colors, it’s radically different in sound from the Nocturnes. Or, perhaps I should say “radically different in sounds,” since each movement, like each movement of the Nocturnes, has a different flavor—there’s no overall Planets sound in the way that there’s an overall sound through the Brahms Third, which we also heard on the last Masterworks concert. Still, for the most part (“Neptune” being the most notable exception), the colors are splashier, grander, more spectacular than Debussy’s. Holst’s music is also more solidly grounded, especially in terms of its harmonic practice. No surprise, really, since as Larry points out, Holst is “dealing with more tangible matters.”

Tangible, but not exactly astronomical. Holst didn’t really intend the music to be a description of the solar system. True, each of the seven movements bears the name of a different planet (all of them except for Earth)—but each is also supplied with an epithet suggesting that its source lies in astrology and mythology. In any case, Holst’s sonic imagination is so vivid that the descriptions are unnecessary. Surely, you hardly need to be told that the opening movement represents “Mars, The Bringer of War” in order to feel the terrifying menace of the First World War (talk about “tangible matters”!) Nor do you need to know that the fourth movement represents “Jupiter, The Bringer of Jollity” in order to be uplifted (in fact, the noble big tune at its center has been adapted as a hymn). The Planets’ magnificent richness of timbre, its unrivalled variety (few other works cover such a range of moods), and its canny dramatic strokes (especially its eerie end) all make verbal explanation nearly irrelevant.

No wonder that since its first public performance roughly a century ago, it has been one of the most popular works in the repertoire, played not only by virtually every orchestra of sufficient size but also adapted for band and taken up, in whole or in part, by a variety of jazz and rock groups as well. It’s also been a great influence on film composers, most obviously John Williams, whose score for Star Wars draws much of its nourishment from Holst. And even if you’ve never heard the work before, it’s so immersive in its impact that, as soon as you start to listen, you’ll be caught up.

Between these two otherworldly works, we have a fantasy based on themes from the 19th century’s “earthiest” opera—Bizet’s Carmen. When it premiered in 1875, it provoked a scandal for a variety of reasons. It featured proletarian characters in all the leading, non-comic roles (no gods or nobles); it had an independent and sexually liberated protagonist who died on stage (the first time that had happened at the Opera-Comique, the house that premiered it); there was smoking on stage, too (by women, no less!): all of this ushered in a new, grittier kind of opera. (Debussy referred to Bizet’s “brothel kind of celebrity.”) But it quickly settled into the repertoire (too late for Bizet to see its success, alas), and it is now one of the most frequently performed operas in the world.

Its appeal comes partly from its double character. On the one hand, this is 19th-century opera at its most realistic. Carmen is based on Prosper Mérimée’s hard-boiled novel of the same name (I use the phrase “hard-boiled” advisedly, since it was a major inspiration for Raymond Chandler when he wrote his hard-boiled Philip Marlowe novels). And it shares not only the heightened drama of the original, but also its profound psychological insights into ethnic conflict, border-crossings, class, and of course gender. On the other hand, it may be the most hummable opera in the repertoire. Even if you think you don’t know it, you probably know many of its tunes, which have saturated our culture in movies, cartoons, ads, background music…. Bizet’s melodies have also been borrowed for variations and fantasies by composers and performers from Sarasate through Vladimir Horowitz and Franz Waxman (whose Carmen Fantasy originated in his score for the film Humoresque) on to Soviet post-modernist Rodion Shchedrin.

Among the most popular of these Carmen-based works is the Fantaisie brillante sur Carmen for flute and orchestra by French flutist François Borne (1840–1920), first published in 1880, just a few years after the opera’s premiere. Little is known about Borne, who would have been totally forgotten were it not for this dazzler (“all fun,” as Larry aptly describes it); but when you hear it, you’ll know why it has kept his name alive. Originally composed for flute and piano, it’s been arranged for flute and orchestra several times—tonight’s version was put together by James Galway. More music from Carmen, by the way, will return on our opera gala, Masterworks 6, on April 20, 2024.

Peter J. Rabinowitz

Have any comments or questions? Please write to me at prabinowitz@ExperienceSymphoria.org