Première Rhapsodie

Rêveusement lent - modérément animé

Debussy’s First Rhapsody was written as a competition piece for student clarinettists at the Paris Conservatoire in 1910. In spite of its not very glamorous origins, it is an attractive and by no means unglamorous piece. Clearly inspired by the clarinet, Debussy seems to have valued the instrument above all for its versatility. The clarinet is cast in two main roles here, as a singer of sustained melodic lines and as a playfully nimble dancer. The first main theme is a “dreamily slow” melody generously curvaceous in shape and elusively supple in rhythm. Although the playful side of the clarinet makes an early appearance in a kind of cadenza, it is the piano that introduces the first hint of the staccato scherzando theme that, a few bars later, the clarinet takes up and runs away with. This theme motivates not only the next episode but also an exuberantly virtuoso coda.

“Pity me,” wrote Debussy to his publisher in July 1910, “On Sunday I’m going to hear my Clarinet Rhapsody eleven times over.” The disadvantage of writing a competition piece for students at the Paris Conservatoire, he clearly thought, was that the composer was expected to sit on the jury that awarded the prizes. In the event, however, “the competition was brilliant and, to judge by the faces of my colleagues, the Rhapsody was a success. One of the competitors played it by heart and like a great musician.” In fact, he was so pleased with the piece that a few months later he completed an orchestral version to make it available to a wider public.

Debussy seems to have valued the clarinet above all for its versatility. In the First Rhapsody (there is no Second Rhapsody, incidentally) the clarinet is cast in two main roles, as a singer of sustained melodic lines and as a playfully nimble dancer. The first main theme, quietly introduced by the clarinet in its middle register after a “dreamily slow” introduction, is a melody generously curvaceous in shape and elusively supple in rhythm. Although the playful side of the clarinet makes an early appearance in a kind of cadenza, it is the piano that introduces the first hint of the staccato scherzando theme that, a few bars later, the clarinet takes up and runs away with. This theme motivates not only the next episode but also an exuberantly virtuoso coda.

Debussy’s First Rhapsody – there is no Second Rhapsody although, paradoxically, there is an earlier, unfinished Rhapsody for saxophone – was written as a competition piece for student clarinettists at the Paris Conservatoire in 1910. In spite of its not very glamorous origins, it is an attractive and by no means unglamorous piece, as the composer himself seems to have concluded. Just before the competition he had written to his publisher, Jacques Durand, “On Sunday, pity me, I’ll be hearing the Clarinet Rhapsody eleven times over!” In the event, however, he was very happy with what he heard: “The clarinet competition was brilliant and, to judge by the faces of my colleagues, the Rhapsody was a success.” He was so pleased with it, in fact, that a few months later he completed an orchestral version to make it available to a wider public.

While he was reluctant to write for the saxophone, even on the payment of a large fee, Debussy was clearly inspired by the clarinet, which he seems to have valued above all for its versatility. In the First Rhapsody the clarinet is cast in two main roles, as a singer of sustained melodic lines and as a playfully nimble dancer. The first main theme, quietly introduced by the clarinet in its middle register after an atmospheric rêveusement lent (“dreamily slow”) introduction for the two instruments in reflective mood, is a melody generously curvaceous in shape and elusively supple in rhythm. The playful side of the instrument makes an early appearance in a kind of cadenza but, at this stage, only to give way to a recall of the first theme, now in the clarinet’s upper register. It is actually the piano that provokes the soloist into its first extended display of its choreographic abilities. And it is the piano that introduces the first hint of the staccato scherzando theme which, a few bars later, the clarinet takes up and runs away with. This theme motivates not only the next episode but also – after a last quiet recall of the clarinet’s own melody and a brief cadenza – an exuberantly virtuoso coda. The clarinet’s final gesture anticipates the beginning of a more famous rhapsody George Gershwin was to write fourteen years later.

Gerald Larner ©2003