La Mer

When it comes to roots, origins, sources, and influences, Debussy is one of the most complex of composers. He was so sensitive to experiences of all kinds — and so absorbent of images and ideas — that we may well envy his capacity to select and marshal artistic impressions of many kinds and then fashion them into new works of art.

Both the outer and inner world contributed to this storehouse of expression, which implies, in the case of La mer that he was not only affected by his own image of the sea and his own contact with it, but that he was also stirred into creating a musical portrait of the sea by other artists’ attempts to do so in other media, especially painting.

His actual contact with the sea was no more varied than that of other reasonably well-to-do Frenchmen of his generation. He spent holidays in Cannes and Arcachon and took advantage of a nearby seacoast during his time at the Villa Medici in Rome. In 1889, he suffered an alarming voyage in a small boat off of Saint-Lunaire, in Brittany.

Visits to London in 1902 and 1903 not only involved Channel crossings, they also allowed him to see a selection of paintings by J.M.W. Turner, whose work he knew and admired but only then was able to study in depth. That prompted Debussy to begin working on La mer in summer 1903, completing and performing the work two years later.

It was not only Turner whose vivid treatment of such subjects touched Debussy. The Impressionists had always appealed profoundly to him, and his work is in many ways a musical counterpart to theirs, La mer especially. The Japanese artist Hokusai, whose woodblocks inspired Monet, Degas, and Cassatt, also attracted the composer; his famous woodblock print, Under the Wave off Kanagawa, appeared on the cover of the full score at Debussy’s request.

“I have loved the ocean and listened to it passionately,” Debussy wrote, as the music instantly confirms. The surge and flow of the sea, the tiniest drops of spray and its whole broad sweep are vividly portrayed. At the same time the three movements, while only claiming to be symphonic “sketches,” add up to a more than passable imitation of a traditional symphony — the outer movements (themselves connected by cyclic recall of earlier themes) enclosing a brisk and breezy scherzo.

Th first movement, evoking the sun rising to its full splendor over the ocean, is the furthest from inherited ideas of formal rigor or musical structure, as it expands and progresses without ever going over its earlier material. Some striking ideas are heard many times, notably the abrupt little rhythm of two notes with which the cellos begin, and the rising and falling melody given out very early by the trumpet and English horn in octaves. As the movement gathers momentum, the wave-like phrases are more recognizable, and a striking episode for sixteen cellos stands out.

In the second movement, illustrating the intricate play of waves, Debussy’s delicate orchestral skill is on display, although there are episodes of disturbing force among the tracery of lighter textures. The third movement portrays the wind in dialogue with the sea, with clear evocations of the first movement. A broad new theme, not unlike those written by Debussy’s compatriot César Franck, recurs in various guises; two cornets join the brass section, and the themes tumble over each other as the work reaches its shimmering conclusion.

 — Hugh Macdonald 

Hugh Macdonald is Avis H. Blewett Professor Emeritus of Music at Washington University in St. Louis. He has written books on Beethoven, Berlioz, Bizet, and Scriabin.