Debussy's Hommage à Rameau: A Future for French Music in a Forgotten Predecessor

Encountering Rameau in the Concert Hall in 1903

Debussy heard the first two acts of Castor et Pollux at the Schola Cantorum in Paris. His review for Gil Blas was later included in Monsieur Croche. In that review, he stated the venue and the extent of the opera he had heard. His experience of listening to this performance early in 1903 and reconsidering Rameau offers a useful connection with the later composition of Hommage à Rameau.

In the passage dealing with Castor's funeral, Debussy was more interested in the people weeping than in their ancient costumes and helmets. In the opera's characters he recognised grief familiar to himself and to contemporary listeners. Writing about Pollux's monologue, he said that he had forgotten the distance in time and space and felt Rameau to be a contemporary. In explaining what moved him at the performance, Debussy valued the characters' expression of feeling more than the age of the composition. Rameau was both a name representing an earlier France and a composer whose music deserved to be performed and heard again.

At this time, efforts were being made in France to restore and publish Rameau's scores. In 1894, Francis Magnard wrote an article in Le Figaro calling for this work. The publisher Durand began issuing a collected edition the following year. Performances of older works required scores that musicians could read. The newspaper's proposal developed into an editorial undertaking shared by composers and a publisher, with keyboard works and operas organised into separate volumes. Publishers and editors were preparing the material that would enable other performers to encounter the Rameau music Debussy had heard in concert.

A Controversial First Opera and the Collected Rameau Edition

Rameau's first opera, Hippolyte et Aricie, was performed in Paris on 1 October 1733. He was fifty and known mainly as a theorist of harmony. The opera was successful, but it also provoked disputes over the music. A composer later invoked in discussions of French musical tradition had divided audiences from his first opera. The career Debussy admired combined Rameau's work as an author setting out musical theory with his work as a composer bringing new music to the stage.

Rameau revised Hippolyte et Aricie for subsequent performances. Versions altered for performances in 1742 and 1757 survive. Even with an opera bearing the same title, the music to be performed changes according to which revision of the composer's score is chosen. The Opéra Comique used the 1757 version for its 2020 production.

Debussy also took part as an editor in Durand's collected Rameau edition. Saint-Saëns edited the keyboard works in the first volume, published in 1895, while d'Indy, Dukas and Guilmant contributed to the opera volumes. Les Fêtes de Polymnie, edited by Debussy, was published in 1908. After paying tribute to his predecessor in the title of a piano piece in 1905, he also undertook the publication of that composer's opera score. In an edition whose work was divided between the publisher and several musicians, Debussy studied and prepared a particular composition. His interest in Rameau continued from criticism and composition into score editing.

His fellow composers also used earlier French music in their own works. Dukas wrote piano variations on a theme by Rameau, and Ravel placed Couperin's name in the title Le Tombeau de Couperin. Around Debussy, other composers were bringing the names and music of their predecessors into new compositions. Dukas made variations on an earlier composer's theme, whereas Debussy wrote a separate piano piece dedicated to Rameau. Composers of the same period remembered musicians of the past while choosing different titles and forms. Each work brought together its honouree and its musical form in a different way.

A Sarabande Treated Freely

Book I of Images contains Reflets dans l'eau, Hommage à Rameau and Mouvement in that order. Debussy completed the three pieces in 1905 and published them as a piano collection. Between two titles referring to water and movement, he placed the name of a composer who had actually lived. He gave the middle piece a title expressing homage, while surrounding it with works of different character. He wrote and revised the three pieces together before sending the collection to Durand. Moved by an old opera, Debussy presented his tribute to Rameau as one piece in this new keyboard collection.

Debussy instructed the pianist to play slowly and gravely. He also specified the style of a sarabande, to be followed without strictness. The sarabande is a dance used in earlier suites. In this score, the composer first indicated the tempo and character, then explained how closely the dance style should be followed. The title honouring Rameau and the reference to a sarabande point to earlier music, while the performer plays the notes and follows the instructions Debussy wrote for this piano piece. The name of an old dance appears alongside the composer's request for freedom in treating its form.

After sending the collection, Debussy asked the publisher Jacques Durand whether he had tried playing the three pieces himself. He then expressed his hope that they would earn a place in the piano literature alongside works by Schumann and Chopin. The composer who had put a predecessor's name in his title was also awaiting the publication and reception of his own music. In this letter, rather than explaining at length why he was honouring Rameau, Debussy discussed how well the newly completed pieces fitted together and the reception they might receive.

Revisions preceded the sending of the score. In August 1905, Debussy told Durand that he would send the three pieces the following week, but changed the schedule because Reflets dans l'eau did not satisfy him. After explaining that he would write another piece reflecting discoveries in harmony, he sent the collection at the end of that month. He continued reviewing the opening piece that would accompany his tribute to Rameau. Mahina's lunch and dinner playlists include Michelangeli's performance of Hommage à Rameau. The work in the playlists belongs to this project in which Debussy revised three pieces together and prepared them for publication.

Writing a Piano Piece and Editing an Opera Score

Although the piece pays homage to Rameau, it is difficult to regard it as a new composition assembled simply by taking over his musical style. Debussy placed his predecessor's name in the title while writing his own piano music. His experience of being moved by Rameau's opera, his performance instruction referring to an old dance, and his completed piano work follow one another. Admiring the earlier composer's music, Debussy used his own harmonies and piano writing in the new piece.

Debussy published his piano piece in 1905, and his edition of Rameau's opera Les Fêtes de Polymnie appeared in 1908. Like Saint-Saëns, d'Indy, Dukas and Guilmant, who contributed to the collected edition, he read and prepared older scores. He continued both composing for piano and publishing his predecessor's opera. After writing a review expressing admiration for Rameau, Debussy devoted time to his own composition and to score editing. The interest he had expressed in writing after hearing a performance led to two different kinds of publication.

A Contemporary Discovered in the Past

Debussy wrote his Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp in 1915. In this sonata he continued his interest in earlier French music, ten years after the publication of Hommage à Rameau. He changed the instrumentation from solo piano to chamber music for three instruments, while continuing to draw on music from earlier periods. After his piano tribute bearing Rameau's name and his work editing an opera, Debussy composed new chamber music.

In the opera Debussy heard from the audience in 1903, a character wept for someone they had lost. In his review, he wrote that this sorrow also spoke to people of his own time. In the piano piece he sent to the publisher in 1905, he wrote Rameau's name and an instruction to play in the style of a sarabande. He also told Durand of his hope that the three pieces might stand alongside Schumann and Chopin. Debussy recorded in writing the reasons for his admiration of older music, then completed new music and awaited its performance and publication. The name of the predecessor he respected remained in the second piece of his new piano collection.

Listening at Mahina

Mahina's music also includes Hommage à Rameau played by Michelangeli. As it plays, you might enjoy sharing the story of how Debussy used a piano piece to express his respect for a musician who had lived long before him.