Classical Music | Soprano

Recorded on 11/06/2010, uploaded on 11/06/2010

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

In the midst of searching for his own unique musical voice, Claude Debussy discovered the works of the Symbolist writers Maurice Maeterlinck, Stéphane Mallarmé, and Paul Verlaine, and thus found a reflection in words of all he sought in his own music. Maeterlinck provided him the means of escaping Wagner’s operatic influence and the libretto to his one and only complete opera Pelléas et Mélisande; Mallarmé offered the inspiration for his revolutionary orchestral tone poem Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune; Verlaine, the text for nearly one-third of Debussy’s total output of song.

The discovery of Verlaine’s poetry was particularly pivotal in the development of Debussy’s mature style. Both men were fond of nuance and sought the means, particularly through rhythm, to reinvent their respective art forms. Thus, it is no surprise that Verlaine came to have a greater influence over the composer than any of Debussy’s other artistic contemporaries. In 1903, Debussy composed his Ariettes oublieés, a song cycle based on Verlaine’s poetry. Numbering six songs in all, the cycle is a clear display of Debussy’s burgeoning mature style, as he fed off the inspiration he received from Verlaine and distanced himself from the early French masters he idolized.

L’ombre des arbres (“The shadow of the trees”) is the third song in the cycle. The text, like that of the previous song, is doleful and Debussy’s music is particularly striking in its ability to portray and enhance its numbing melancholy. The narrator, speaking of some “traveler,” compares the wanderer’s soul to the barren and desolate landscape about him, where even nature itself seems to lament his drowned hopes. Two motives, heard in the brief prologue given to the piano, form the basis of Debussy’s setting in which Verlaine’s text is given a dramatic treatment. Each of the song’s two stanzas begins similarly, but the second changes to reflect the shift of focus from the bleak landscape to the traveler’s own destitute soul. Interestingly, despite the poem’s pessimistic tone, the piano brings the song to a close in the major mode, perhaps as a means of creating an effective bridge to the innocent and joyful song that follows.      Joseph DuBose

Claude Debussy: Ariettes oubliées

Year/Date of Composition 1885-1887:

I and II: March 1887

III and IV: 6 and 10 January 1885

V: January 1886

Year of First Publication 1888 Librettist Paul Verlaine (1844-1896) Language French Dedication Mary Garden Piece Style Early 20th century Instrumentation Voice and Piano