38th Annual Student Research Conference
Claude Debussy's String Quartet in G Minor - Advancing Form and Harmony in the 19th Century
Conner R. Gallagher*, Lainie M. Mueller, Tucker M. Maxwell, and Evan L. O'Day
Dr. Brian X. Kubin, Faculty Mentor
Debussy's String Quartet, completed in 1893, was his first and last entry into the quartet repertory. Written when he was 31 years of age, Debussy sought out a unique formal and tonal language that would inspire the next generation of composers to experiment with harmony and structure. In this piece, you will not hear a traditional sonata form, but rather what has become known as a cyclic structure. It is driven and held together by development of the main theme, which is contorted and transformed over the course of the piece. It’s cohesion is in its motives, and its form is not sectional, but rather a long arc, which wraps around on itself.
Writers who followed him, like Pierre Boulez, Maurice Ravel, and Arnold Schoenberg each cited Debussy as a major source of inspiration, that paved the way for the impressionist and atonalist schools.
Keywords: Debussy, String Quartet, Cyclic Form, Atonalism, Chamber Music, Impressionism, Music, Classical Music
Topic(s):Music
History
Art
Presentation Type: Performance Art
Session: TBA
Location: TBA
Time: TBA