View source for Impressionism in music

{{short description|Movement in Western classical music}}
{{hatnote|Not to be confused with [[expressionist music]], which has different characteristics from this type of music.}}
{{about|the musical movement and style|the visual art movement|Impressionism|other uses|Impressionism (disambiguation)}}
{{Expand German|Impressionismus (Musik)|date=December 2019}}
{{History of Western art music}}
'''Impressionism in music''' was a movement among various composers in Western [[classical music]] (mainly during the late 19th and early 20th centuries) whose music focuses on mood and atmosphere, "conveying the moods and emotions aroused by the subject rather than a detailed tone‐picture".<ref>Michael Kennedy, "Impressionism", ''The Oxford Dictionary of Music'', second edition, revised, Joyce Bourne, associate editor (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2006). {{ISBN|978-0-19-861459-3}}.</ref> "Impressionism" is a philosophical and aesthetic term borrowed from late 19th-century French painting after [[Claude Monet|Monet's]] ''[[Impression, Sunrise]]''. Composers were labeled Impressionists by analogy to the Impressionist painters who use starkly contrasting colors, effect of light on an object, blurry foreground and background, flattening perspective, etc. to make the observer focus their attention on the overall impression.<ref name=Burkholder>J. Peter Burkholder, [[Donald Jay Grout]] and Claude V. Palisca, ''A History of Western Music'', eighth edition (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2010). {{ISBN|978-0-393-93280-5}}. {{Page needed|date=November 2014}}</ref>

The most prominent feature in musical Impressionism is the use of "color", or in musical terms, [[timbre]], which can be achieved through [[orchestration]], harmonic usage, texture, etc.<ref name="Gasser">[[Nolan Gasser]], [http://www.classicalarchives.com/period/8.html "Impressionism"]. ''Classical Archives''. Accessed 9 November 2011.</ref> Other elements of musical Impressionism also involve new chord combinations, [[Tonality#19th century|ambiguous tonality]], [[Extended chord|extended harmonies]], use of [[Mode (music)|modes]] and exotic scales, [[Parallel harmony|parallel motion]], [[Program music|extra-musicality]], and evocative titles such as “''[[Reflets dans l'eau]]''”
(“Reflections on the water”), “''[[Brouillards]]''” (“Mists”), etc.<ref name=Burkholder />

==History==
[[Claude Debussy]] and [[Maurice Ravel]] are two leading figures in Impressionism, though Debussy rejected this label (in a 1908 letter to [[Jacques Durand (publisher)|Jacques Durand]] he wrote "imbeciles call [what I am trying to write in ''Images''] 'impressionism', a term employed with the utmost inaccuracy, especially by art critics who use it as a label to stick on [[J. M. W. Turner|Turner]], the finest creator of mystery in the whole of art!"<ref>{{cite book |last=Debussy |first=Claude |editor-first1=François |editor-last1=Lesure |editor-first2=Roger |editor-last2=Nichols |translator-first=Roger |translator-last=Nichols |title=Debussy Letters |publisher=Harvard University Press |year=1987 |page=188 |isbn=978-0-674-19429-8 }}</ref>) and Ravel displayed discomfort with it, at one point claiming that it could not be adequately applied to music at all.<ref>Maurice Ravel, ''A Ravel Reader: Correspondence, Articles, Interviews'', compiled and edited by [[Arbie Orenstein]] (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990): p. 421. {{ISBN|978-0-231-04962-7}}. Unaltered paperback reprint (Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, 2003), {{ISBN|978-0-486-43078-2}}.</ref> Debussy's Impressionist works typically "evoke a mood, feeling, atmosphere, or scene" by creating musical images through characteristic motifs, harmony, non-diatonic scales (e.g., whole-tone and pentatonic scales), instrumental timbre, large unresolved chords (e.g., 9ths, 11ths, 13ths), parallel motion, ambiguous tonality, chromaticism, heavy use of the piano pedals, and other elements.<ref name=Burkholder /> “The perception of Debussy’s compositional language as decidedly post-romantic/Impressionistic—nuanced, understated, and subtle—is firmly solidified among today’s musicians and well-informed audiences."<ref>{{Cite book|date=2018-12-31|editor-last=de Médicis|editor-first=François|editor2-last=Huebner|editor2-first=Steven|title=Debussy's Resonance|url=http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/9781787442528|doi=10.1017/9781787442528|isbn=978-1-78744-252-8|s2cid=239438810}}</ref> Some Impressionist composers, Debussy and Ravel in particular, are also labeled as [[Symbolism_(arts)#Music|symbolist composers]]. One trait shared with both aesthetic trends is "a sense of detached observation: rather than expressing deeply felt emotion or telling a story"; as in [[Symbolism_(arts)|symbolist poetry]], the normal syntax is usually disrupted and individual images that carry the work's meaning are evoked.<ref name=Burkholder />

In 1912, the French composer [[Ernest Fanelli]] (1860–1917) received significant attention and coverage in the Parisian press following a performance of a [[symphonic poem]] he wrote in 1886, titled ''Thèbes'',<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Calvocoressi |first=M. D. |date=1912 |title=An Unknown Composer of To-Day: M. Ernest Fanelli |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/905497 |journal=The Musical Times |volume=53 |issue=830 |pages=225–226|doi=10.2307/905497 |jstor=905497 |url-access=subscription }}</ref> incorporating elements associated with Impressionism, such as [[extended chord]]s and [[whole-tone scale]]s.<ref>{{Cite web |author=Adriano |editor-last=Anderson |editor-first=Keith |year=2002 |title=Fanelli: Symphonic Pictures – Bourgault-Duboudray: Rhapsodie cambodgienne {{!}} About this recording |type=CD booklet |url=https://www.naxos.com/MainSite/BlurbsReviews/?itemcode=8.225234&catnum=225234&filetype=AboutThisRecording&language=English |publisher=Marco Polo |location=London |via=naxos.com}}</ref> Ravel was unimpressed by Fanelli's novelties, maintaining that these were already utilized by past composers such as [[Franz Liszt]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Orledge |first=Robert |editor-last=Mawer |editor-first=Deborah |year=2000 |chapter=Evocations of exoticism |title=The Cambridge Companion to Ravel |pages=27–46 |series=Cambridge Companions to Music |location=Cambridge, UK |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-64856-1}}</ref>{{rp|36}} He also opined that Fanelli's Impressionism stemmed from [[Hector Berlioz]] rather than Liszt or Russian composers.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Ravel |first=Maurice |editor-last=Orenstein |editor-first=Arbie |year=2003 |title=A Ravel Reader: Correspondence, Articles, Interviews |publisher=Dover Publications |location=Mineola, New York |pages=349–350 |isbn=978-0-486-43078-2}}</ref>

Other composers linked to Impressionism include [[Lili Boulanger]],<ref>[https://www.allmusic.com/composition/nocturne-for-violin-or-flute-piano-mc0002362240] By Sylvia Typaldos, Nocturne for violin (or flute) & piano</ref><ref>[https://www.allmusic.com/composition/pie-jesu-for-mezzo-soprano-string-quartet-harp-organ-mc0002385561] By Sylvia Typaldos, Pie Jesu for mezzo-soprano, string quartet, harp & organ</ref> [[Isaac Albéniz]],<ref name="Columbia" /> [[Frederick Delius]],<ref name="Trombley" /> [[Paul Dukas]],<ref name="Columbia" /> [[Alexander Scriabin]],<ref>[[Christopher Palmer]], ''Impressionism in Music'' (London: Hutchinson; New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1973): 208.</ref> [[Manuel de Falla]],<ref name="Columbia" /> [[John Alden Carpenter]],<ref name="Columbia" /> [[Ottorino Respighi]], [[Albert Roussel]], [[Karol Szymanowski]], [[Charles Tomlinson Griffes]], and [[Federico Mompou]].<ref name="Columbia">",[[Ivar Henning Mankell]] and [[Blair Fairchild]][https://web.archive.org/web/20090403135311/http://www.bartleby.com/65/im/impress-mus.html Impressionism, in Music]", ''The Columbia Encyclopedia'', sixth edition (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007)  (Archive copy from 3 April 2009, accessed 25 December 2012).</ref> The Finnish composer [[Jean Sibelius]] is also associated with Impressionism,<ref name="Trombley" /> and his [[tone poem]] ''[[The Swan of Tuonela]]'' (1893) predates Debussy's ''[[Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune]]'' (regarded as a seminal work of musical Impressionism) by a year.<ref name="Trombley" /> The American composer [[Howard Hanson]] also borrowed from both Sibelius and Impressionism generally in works such as his [[Symphony No. 2 (Hanson)|Second Symphony]].<ref name="Trombley">Richard Trombley, "Impressionism in Music", ''Encyclopedia of Music in the 20th Century'', edited by Lol Henderson and Lee Stacey (London and Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1999). {{ISBN|978-1-57958-079-7}}; {{ISBN|978-1-135-92946-6}}.</ref>

== Characteristics ==
One of the most important tools of musical Impressionism was the tensionless harmony. The [[Consonance and dissonance|dissonance]] of chords was not resolved, but was used as timbre. These chords were often shifted parallel. In the melodic field the whole tone scale, the pentatonic and [[mode (music)|modal scales]] were used. The melodics were characterized by their circular melodic movements. The timbre became the stylistic device of Impressionism instead of concise themes or other traditional forms.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Musikalischer Impressionismus in Musik {{!}} Schülerlexikon {{!}} Lernhelfer|url=https://www.lernhelfer.de/schuelerlexikon/musik/artikel/musikalischer-impressionismus|access-date=2020-06-12|website=www.lernhelfer.de|language=de}}</ref>{{Better source needed|date=August 2022}}

==See also==

* [[History of music]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==Further reading==
* Fulcher, Jane. ''Debussy and His World''. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2001. {{ISBN|978-0-691-09042-9}}. 
* Machlis, Joseph, and Kristine Forney. ''The Enjoyment of Music'', seventh edition. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1995. {{ISBN|0-393-96643-7}}.
* Pasler, Jann. "Impressionism". ''[[The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians]]'', second edition, edited by [[Stanley Sadie]] and [[John Tyrrell (musicologist)|John Tyrrell]]. London: Macmillan Publishers, 2001.
*Thompson, Oscar. ''Debussy, Man and Artist''. New York: Dodd, Mead & company, 1937.

{{Impressionists}}
{{Impressionist music}}
{{Modernism (music)}}

[[Category:Impressionist music]]