Written in January 2011. Listen to the piece here, as recorded by Vladimir Horowitz.
…the aural work of Claude Debussy, musician of suggestion and atmosphere, not explicit emotion or story. If one perceives a song as a mirage only, how can one faithfully capture the music in words without involving assumptive interpretations? This is my challenge as I listen to Debussy’s “L’isle Joyeuse,” or “The Island of Pleasure.”
The first listen, eyes closed: This piece sounds like something I have known before—I have not heard it before, nor have I heard anything quite like it, but my soul feels a nostalgic familiarity. The experience seems like walking through a misty dream, or hearing the texture of soft white light. The trills, the escalation, and the dissonance create a tension that holds over me throughout the piece, never leaving until the very end.
The second listen, still eyes closed: The same musical ideas return over and over—the pervading trills and downward trios, the fleeting call and response, the passionate melody—but each time, they are new again. Yet, they are new not because of the modulations, nor is it the dynamics, nor are these musical designs returning in the way a pop song cannot stop repeating itself. Once heard, the ideas—not the notes, but the inkling of the tension their pattern once caused—are more powerful the second time, the louder time, the time it appears in a different key, but not because of those facts. How is a repeated idea new, but not because of what makes it different, but because it is repeated, which should make it no longer new?
The third listen, eyes open so I can record what I feel, section by section: There are suspenseful trills and trios, graceful and playfully light ups and downs, dissonance with harmony, elevating motions, grand arpeggios across the keys. The glorious breakthrough of the melodious theme, consonant yet uncertain, mellifluous, surreal. This music makes me want to move; this music moves me. Dissonant reprises, sprinting scales, spinning out of control to a sudden STOP, then a steady growth. A glorious culmination—intense warmth, then a chill, runs through my body as the poignant theme returns, the jarring 5-on-3 rhythm of mismatched notes only adding to the magnificence. As in a pas de deux,¹ with a man’s powerful whirling grand jetés across the dance floor, sweeping the lady into a motion that spirals outward to the universe. Finally, return to the tensive trills, tremolo, crescendo, accelerando, expand—and done.
The fourth listen, viewing the musical score: Debussy demands the impossible of his performer. How can one articulate piano, piu piano, and pianissimo—differences in volume that the human ear can barely perceive?² The interpreter must use his own judgment to let the dynamics expand beyond the given narrow range, if he wishes to convey the full color of the piece’s dynamic tensions.
The fifth listen, eyes closed again: The middle melody, bold yet wistful, is an altogether different species from the main themes. Do you know the precious feeling of waking up beside your lover? The gentle smile, the tranquil rays sifting onto the sheets, treasured in his arms, an internal yet explosive passion? That is how the melody cherishes me. In movies, there is a romantic image of running downhill through a large grassy field, the wind through your hair like silk on your skin…this characterizes the post-melody. And now, imagine the desire for an idealistic, eternal love fulfilled. This love seems but an illusion, for love is mercurial, complex, vague; the rapid repetition of motifs perhaps exudes apprehension, anxiety, tension; the confusion we find when enveloped by love; the surprise color changes, like the sudden march-like major chords leading to the climax, might capture love’s vicissitudes; the tender singing voice of the second theme captures the high of being one with one’s love. “L’isle Joyeuse” could be a snapshot of the turbulent emotions of love, both the reality and the dream, both the insanity and the reason.
The sixth listen, now paying particular attention to contrast, in order to explore how Debussy manipulates the tension: he fills his work with contradictions: the juxtaposition of grating trills with playful up and down arpeggios, and of cacophonous note mixtures with smooth, measured melody; the coexistence of consonance and dissonance, superimposed rhythms; uplifting brilliance contrasting with quietude; lack of definite scale or scheme, surprise bursts throughout. “L’isle Joyeuse” inspires in me an overall sense of happiness and peace, but deep and jumbled feelings. Debussy calls it an “Island of Pleasure,” but much of the piece is particularly intended to sound discordant and tense, if not unpleasant. The pleasant and unpleasant exist alongside, swapping roles of harmony and melody, articulation and dynamics, rhythm and speed: the sweet melody of the second theme is placed with bitter rhythm, the violent harmonies leading up to the climax are paired with classical-style swelling of both loudness and velocity.
The seventh listen: Music of the classical and romantic periods established the norms for evoking emotions: the minor key is for doleful nocturnes, the major key for grand, sweeping pronouncements of delight. Debussy, however, does not commit to any key for his description of pleasure; he even uses the blindingly positive major chords of C and Eb for a fleeting two measures each to rudely interfere with the recapitulation’s dissonant chaos. Until the finish, Debussy never entirely relieves the listener from musical tension; he allows dissonance to give way to consonance, or halts the countless reiterations, or lets the voice to descend to lower pitches, but never all at the same time. To describe his pleasure, Debussy instead seems to capture the stress that comes before it. Indeed, right after the final appearance of the melodious theme, the dissonant chaotic repeats itself again and again until there is resolution to the tonic chord, and the mind can relax. However, the pleasure is not only at the conclusion, but throughout; the powerful melodic theme, the mischievously swinging ups and downs, the haunting trills, still linger in the mind after it is done and the pleasure is gone. One finds pleasure in the process of achieving pleasure, yet this process is riddled with what is not purely pleasurable. To evoke pleasure, one necessarily searches for the displeasure, the stress, the tension; and only with that contrast does one find joy.
Footnotes
1. In ballet, a duet performed by the principal male and female, often in a romantic context.
2. piano is Italian for ”soft” in volume; piu piano and pianissimo are both Italian for “very soft.” Because piano and pianissimo are the standard dynamic markings for volume, and because piu piano is used only relative to piano, the pianist typically infers that piu piano is louder than pianissimo, but only negligibly so.