“La Mer”: Debussy’s Sonic Portrait of the Sea

Claude Debussy’s La Mer (“The Sea”) is not a literal portrait of the ocean. There is no “program” or story, as we might hear in Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony or a Strauss tone poem. Instead, La Mer takes us deep into the world of atmosphere, metaphor and synesthesia (a blurring of senses). Shimmering colors, the play of light on water, and a vivid sense of motion blend together to form a magical, ever-changing soundscape. As with the sea, La Mer runs the cosmic gamut from serene tranquility to terrifying, awe-inspiring power.

Debussy finished the work, which he subtitled “Three Symphonic Sketches,” in March, 1905 at the Grand Hotel at Eastbourne on the coast of the English Channel- a location he described to his publisher as “a charming peaceful spot: the sea unfurls itself with an utterly British correctness.” But most of the composition was done far from water. In a published review of Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony, the composer wrote that music should, “not attempt at direct imitation, but rather [capture] the invisible sentiments of nature.” He drew more inspiration from depictions of the sea in paintings and literature than from actual salt water. For the cover of the score, he chose The Great Wave (pictured above), a woodblock print by the Japanese artist, Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) which influenced French painters such as Monet. Debussy called distant childhood memories of summers spent by the Mediterranean at Cannes, “worth more than reality.”

La Mer is filled with this sense of the intangible and ephemeral. We experience this music as a vast, gradually-unfolding musical stream of consciousness in which motives evolve with an organic, self-organizing perfection. All of this suggests an inherent lack of formal structure. Yet, in his book, Debussy in Proportionthe musicologist Roy Howat shows that, perhaps unbeknownst to the composer, La Mer‘s sections adhere to the exact mathematical ratios of the Golden Section. The author Jean Barraque described this “openness” of form as a “sonorous becoming… a developmental process in which the very notions of exposition and development coexist in an uninterrupted burst.” We hear the Eastern sounds of the Javanese Gamelan which had captivated Parisians at the 1889 Paris Exposition. Instead of moving towards a far-off goal, this is music which is always arriving at an eternal present. This is largely the result of the underlying harmony. Instead of the gravitational “pull” of a conventional major or minor scale, this music floats into the much different world of the whole tone and pentatonic scales. In many ways, this music still sounds “modern” over a hundred years later. Perhaps it isn’t surprising that the first audience left the concert hall baffled and unable to fully grasp this revolutionary and transformative music, written by one of music history’s greatest rule-breakers.

The first movement, “From dawn to noon on the sea” gradually awakens, emerging out of mysterious, dark, icy depths. One of La Mer’s most prominent motives is announced by the unique voice of the muted trumpet combined with the English horn (beginning around the 0:48 mark). This is only one of many voices, each with its distinct persona, which comes alive throughout this piece. This opening fades into a vivacious theme, introduced by a choir of cellos, divided into parts (4:40). Rising, suddenly, out of a moment of eerie calm, a majestic brass chorale brings the first movement to a close.

The second movement, “Play of the Waves” (9:00) is an effervescent scherzo, filled with playful splashes of color and light. In this extraordinary passage, listen to the way the music works itself up into a frenzy of euphoria, eventually going one step too far and tumbling back to earth. All of this exuberant fun fades into an expansive sonic vista of serene majesty at the end of the movement. Debussy’s biographer Oscar Thompson offers this poetic description of the music:

a world of sheer fantasy, of strange visions and eerie voices, a mirage of sight and equally a mirage of sound. On the sea’s vast stage is presented trance-like phantasmagoria so evanescent and fugitive that it leaves behind only the vagueness of a dream.

The final movement, “Dialogue of the wind and the sea” (15:26), evokes awe and terror. We’re confronted with an ominous power as the motives from the first movement return. There is a distant echo of that majestic chorale from the end of the first movement. Then, perhaps for the first time in the entire piece, we arrive at a decisive tonal center in D-flat major. What begins as a quietly haunting melody in the woodwinds grows into a passionate statement in the strings. In its final momentsLa mer gives us a glimpse of ultimate, transcendent majesty, simultaneously triumphant and sensuously beautiful.

I’ve provided a brief guide to this amazing piece. Now, I recommend that you forget about analysis, close your eyes, and just listen…

Music is a mysterious mathematical process whose elements are part of Infinity…There is nothing more musical than a sunset. He who feels what he sees will find no more beautiful example of development in all that book which, alas, musicians read but too little — the book of Nature.

-Claude Debussy

Five Great Recordings

Photograph: The Great Wave, Katsushika Hokusai

About Timothy Judd

A native of Upstate New York, Timothy Judd has been a member of the Richmond Symphony violin section since 2001. He is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music where he earned the degrees Bachelor of Music and Master of Music, studying with world renowned Ukrainian-American violinist Oleh Krysa.

The son of public school music educators, Timothy Judd began violin lessons at the age of four through Eastman’s Community Education Division. He was a student of Anastasia Jempelis, one of the earliest champions of the Suzuki method in the United States.

A passionate teacher, Mr. Judd has maintained a private violin studio in the Richmond area since 2002 and has been active coaching chamber music and numerous youth orchestra sectionals.

In his free time, Timothy Judd enjoys working out with Richmond’s popular SEAL Team Physical Training program.

2 thoughts on ““La Mer”: Debussy’s Sonic Portrait of the Sea”

  1. This is a great place to listen to your favorite music, often several recordings of the same composition so that we can choose which recording we like best.

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  2. Whilst it’s true that Debussy submitted the completed full score of La Mer to his publisher Durand on 5th March 1905 – and this is the actual publish date – he did not write/orchestrate/finish any of La Mer in Eastbourne on the English South Coast, at which he arrived on 23rd July 1905. He took with him the printed parts to correct – to which no substantive alterations where made; the pencil corrections visible in the original Ms are from the 1909 revision. The copyright of the full printed score was taken by Durand before Debussy left Paris for England to protect the work should it go missing en route.
    Debussy wrote one original work at Eastbourne, a replacement 1st movt. for Images bk 1 which he called ‘Reflets dans l’eau’ – the water described in this lovely piano piece is obviously not the sea, but something much less energetic than the choppy Channel!
    I stayed with my father in the Grand Hotel, Eastbourne when young (although not in the celebrated Room 200 as Debussy had!), which is how I became interested in the story that Debussy wrote/orchestrated, etc. La Mer there, I was disappointed to discover it a myth…like the Loch Ness Monster!
    Those wishing to listen to a fabulous orchestral score written in the Grand Hotel, Eastbourne should dig out Frank Bridge’s ‘The Sea’ (1910). Bridge later built a house near Eastbourne at Friston and is buried in the churchyard there.

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