Claude Debussy 1862-1918

Sheet Music and Program Notes

Debussey was a french composer and pianist of the Impressionistis era.  He was one of the most influential composers in the 20th century.  He entered the Paris Conservatory at the age of 10.  Debussey was fourty years old before he became widly recognized.  Some of his more notable works are Pelleas et Melisande, Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun, Nocturnes, Images, La mer.

He did not compose symphonies and regard them as a form of the past.  AlthoughDebussy was friends with Eric Satie Camille Saint-Saens had nothing nice to say about him and detested his music.

Debussy said, "We must agree that the beauty of a work of art will always remain a mystery, we can never be absolutely sure how it's made.  We must at all costs preserve this magic which is peculiar to music and to which music, by its nature is of all the arts the most receptive."