"This is a Borzoi book published by Alfred A. Knopf"--Title page verso. Includes bibliographical references (pages 309-311) and index.
Contents:
Prelude : A biography of sorts -- What the modern made of him. Songs for Marie -- Up at the villa -- New rules, old morals -- MallarmeĢ and Maeterlinck -- Bilitis and other women -- Lilly versus the piano -- Taking to the water -- Images in name as well as fact -- A crumbling house and a sunken cathedral -- Theatres of the body and the mind -- War in black and white -- Indian summer, stygian winter -- What the modern made of him.
Summary:
Claude Debussy was that rare creature, a composer who reinvented the language of music without alienating the majority of music lovers. He is the modernist everyone loves. How did he manage this? Was it through the association of his music with visual images, or was it simply that, by throwing out the rule book of the Paris Conservatoire where he studied, his music put beauty of sound above the spiritual ambitions of the German tradition from which those rules derived. Stephen Walsh's thought-provoking biography, told partly through the events of Debussy's life, and partly through a critical discussion of his music, addresses these and other questions about one of the most influential composers of the early twentieth century.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.