Debussy: La fille aux cheveux de lin (The Girl with the Flaxen Hair) By Claude Debussy / ed. Maurice Hinson Piano Sheet Level: Early Advanced Item: 00-893. Add to Cart Add to List.

1. Claude Debussy The Girl With The Flaxen Hair
2. Claude Debussy A The Girl With The Flaxen Hair Analysis Summary
3. Claude Debussy A The Girl With The Flaxen Hair Analysis Poem

I am very happy to announce a new publication for the Online Academy – a study edition of Debussy’s Prelude La fille aux cheveux de lin (The Girl with the Flaxen Hair).

This is among Debussy’s best-loved works for the piano, and a piece many pianists choose to play. Despite its apparent simplicity, this short 39-bar piece is actually deceptively difficult to bring off. My enhanced study edition aims to give practical solutions to the numerous problems in pedalling the work poses, together with fingerings and exercises that will make some of the more awkward passages much easier to manage. The study score contains comprehensive footnotes with text and musical examples; there are also short video clips you can view by scanning the QR codes with your phone as you practise.

The title La fille aux cheveux de lin came from Leconte de Lisle’s poem by the same name, included in the Chansons ecossaises (Scottish Songs) from 1852. In this, the eighth piece from the first book of Préludes composed around 1910, Debussy is painting a picture of an innocent and naive Scottish girl. He uses conventional diatonic harmony blended in with pentatonic scales, modal cadences as well as parallel chord movement. As in all the preludes, the title comes at the end of the piece, in brackets. It is as though Debussy wanted the listener to form their own impressions of the music first – unencumbered by any preconceptions.

Debussy’s own style of playing was based on simplicity; it was unmannered and free of rhythmic distortions. French music of this period requires a style of playing that is in general much cooler and more objective than Germanic music, for example. We should guard against romanticising the piece by not adding extra rubato – Debussy marks all timings and articulations scrupulously in the score. The metronome mark of crotchet = 66 is the composer’s own.

The dynamic level of the first half of the piece is predominantly p; after the climax in bar 21 (a mere mf) we find passages at the pp level. Balance in the chordal passages (bar 5-6, and 21-28) needs to be carefully judged so that the upper notes are clearly audible, but with just the right amount of substance from the lower notes to create a unified texture at the required dynamic level. Achieving the right sound requires a lot of experimentation in the practice room – this can be quite a painstaking process relying on careful, critical listening.

Pedalling is problematic in this piece, requiring thought and organisation – especially in the places with big LH chords (bars 6, 31-32, and 36) and where a bass note needs to be caught in the pedal. Timing the foot with the hands precisely is key in these places. The pedal markings I have included in my study edition are suggestions only. I have not indicated the shift (soft) pedal at all (una corda) but it is of course there to be used and can certainly assist in creating tonal contrast. Remember that the shift pedal changes the timbre of the sound, and its effects depend largely on the individual piano. It is not all to do with creating a soft dynamic but rather a woolly, unfocussed type sound and can therefore be used in dynamics up to about the mf level (experiment with playing firmly with the shift pedal down). When all is said and done pedalling is a subtle and personal matter that can never really be notated satisfactorily.

“Pedalling cannot be written down. It varies from one instrument to another, from one room, or one hall, to another.” Claude Debussy

Debussy the Girl With the Flaxen Hair on Spotify. Claude Debussy Song 2020. By Claude Debussy / arr. Clarinet & Keyboard Part(s). 'Girl with the Flaxen Hair' and 'Golliwog's Cakewalk' are two of Claude Debussy's most popular piano works. It has been said that 'Girl with the Flaxen Hair,' with its impressionistic and progressive harmonies, may have been a significant influence for many jazz artists of the. Claude Debussy: The Girl With The Flaxen Hair Analysis I am playing Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines with community (unofficial) plus patch v8.4.2, and I am attempting to achieve both the 'Pimpin' for Romero' and 'You Only Die Once A Night' quests that he provides.

A legato fingering is essential in a legato context wherever possible, not only for joins but also to ensure good phrase shaping and natural timings. I have indicated fingerings that help achieve a legato by hand (where appropriate), and these include finger substitutions and sliding the 5th finger from a black note to a white to avoid breaking the line. Both hands in bars 14-15 and 21-35 can be connected by hand; it requires positioning the hand so that fingers can go under or indeed over other fingers but it can be done and will feel and sound very good with a little perseverance. Practise such spots without pedal, getting as close as possible to a connected sound before adding the pedal carefully (remember you do not have to go all the way to the bottom of the pedal). Here is a practice exercise for this spot, applicable to when the passage comes back towards the end too.

It is always interesting to listen to orchestral transcriptions of piano music when available. This version, arranged by Leopold Stokowski, is full of colour and interest.

How to access this study edition and online resources?

Walkthrough and practice worksheet

Click here to view the walkthrough and practice worksheets on the Online Academy. If you are subscriber then these online resources (including the walk-through and practice worksheets) are available as part of your subscription. Otherwise please click here to find out more about the subscription options.

Annotated Study Edition

If you are a premium subscriber or own our Annotated Study Edition bundle, then the complete study edition (with links to online resources) has been added to your account automatically and can be accessed from the My eBooks section of the Online Academy website. If you aren’t a premium subscriber or don’t own our study edition bundle then you can also purchase it using one of the following links:

• Annotated Study Edition – click here to purchase for £4.99
• Annotated Study Edition bundle – click here to purchase a bundle of all five Study Editions plus ongoing updates for £19.99
• Practising the Piano & Study Edition bundle – click here to purchase a bundle which includes all four volumes of Practising the Piano eBook series and the complete Annotated Study Edition bundle (with ongoing updates) for £54.99.

La fille aux cheveux de lin is a musical composition by French composer Claude Debussy. It is the eighth piece in the composer's first book of Préludes, written between late 1909 and early 1910. The title is in French and translates roughly to 'The Girl with the Flaxen Hair'. The piece is 39 measures long and takes approximately two and a half minutes to play. It is in the key of G♭ major.

The piece, named after the eponymous poem by Leconte de Lisle, is known for its musical simplicity, a divergence from Debussy's style at the time. Completed in January 1910, it was published three months later and premiered in June of that same year. The prelude is one of the most recorded pieces of Debussy's, both in its original version and in subsequent various arrangements.

Background and influence

The title La fille aux cheveux de lin was inspired by Leconte de Lisle's poem by the same name, one of his Chansons écossaises (Scottish songs) from his 1852 collection Poèmes antiques (Ancient Poems).^[1][2] The image of a girl with flaxen-coloured hair has been utilized in fine art as a symbol of innocence and naivety.^[1] Musical writers have suggested that Debussy's successful portrayal of these emotions was tied in with the musical simplicity of the prelude—specifically, the technical and harmonic elements.^[1][3] His choice of simplicity for this piece was highly unusual, since it deviated from his style at the time and brought back the simple harmonies that he had utilized in his earlier musical compositions, which were more traditional.^[1][4]

Debussy had previously utilized the title for a mélodie he wrote from 1882 to 1884.^[5] However, it does not feature any similarities to the 1910 prelude,^[2] and merely has a 'distant familial relationship' with the prelude at most according to James R. Briscoe in the music journal 19th-Century Music.^[5] The song, which is one of his earlier works and remains unpublished, was dedicated to Marie-Blanche Vasnier.^[6] She had an affair with Debussy at the time, and he dedicated most of the compositions he wrote from 1880 to 1884 to her.^[7]

Poem

Leconte de Lisle's original poem was written in French. In English, it is translated as:

On the lucerne midst flowers in bloom,
Who sings praises to morning?
It is the girl with golden hair,
The beauty with lips of cherry.
For, love, in clear summer sunlight,
Has soared with the lark and sung now.
Your mouth has such colours divine,
My dear, so tempting to kisses.
On grass in bloom, talk to me, please,
Girl with fine curls and long lashes.
For, love, in clear summer sunlight,
Has soared with the lark and sung now.
Do not say no, cruel maiden.
Do not say yes. Better to know
The long lasting gaze of your eyes
And your rosy lips, oh, my belle.
For, love, in clear summer sunlight,
Has soared with the lark and sung now.
Farewell, you deer, farewell you hares
And the red partridge. I want
To stroke the gold of your tresses
Smothering lips with my kisses.
For, love, in clear summer sunlight,
Has soared with the lark and sung now.^[1]

1. ^de Lisle, Leconte. 'Poems in Translation - Charles-Marie René Leconte de Lisle'. Poems Without Frontiers. David Paley. Retrieved 24 October 2016.

History

The prelude was completed on 15–16 January 1910,^[2] and was first published in April of that same year, along with the rest of his preludes from Book I. Its first performance was given by Franz Liebich at the Bechstein Hall in London two months later, on 2 June.^[8] This was followed by an American premiere at the Stockbridge Casino in Stockbridge, Massachusetts on 26 July 1910, performed by Walter Morse Rummel.^[9] Subsequently, the French premiere took place the following year on 14 January at the Société Nationale de Musique in Paris, with Ricardo Viñes performing the work.^[8]

A transcription of the prelude for violin and piano was created by Arthur Hartmann—a close friend of Debussy^[10]—and released in May 1910.^[11]

La fille remains one of the most recorded musical compositions of Debussy's.^[12] Despite its performance on a recurring basis, the prelude remains popular among audiences,^[4] partly because of its 'memorable tune' which is juxtaposed with a 'mellow accompaniment'.^[13] It has received acclaim for its expansiveness of emotion,^[3] with the Richmond Times-Dispatch's Clarke Bustard describing the piece as 'perhaps the most delicately characterful' out of all his twenty-four preludes.^[14]

Claude Debussy The Girl With The Flaxen Hair

Musical analysis

Placement within Preludes, Book I

Debussy was known for his meticulousness in the arrangement of his preludes.^[15] Pianist and musical writer Paul Roberts asserts that this prelude, along with the two that immediately precede it, forms 'the central arch'^[2] of Book I's structure, since the three pieces provide the most 'dramatic contrast'^[2] out of all the preludes in the first book. The sixth prelude, Des pas sur la neige (Footprints in the Snow), evokes a feeling of sadness and isolation,^[15] while Ce qu'a vu le vent d'ouest (What the West wind saw)—the seventh—exudes a violent and tumultuous nature.^[16] In stark contrast to these two, La fille brings about a sense of gentle 'lyricism' and 'warmth', which is uncharacteristic of Debussy's music of this kind.^[16] By placing these three preludes in this particular order, Debussy ensured that arguably the most technically challenging prelude of the collection (Vent d'ouest) was situated in-between the two that are the simplest to play out of the twenty-four.^[16]

Composition

The prelude's central idea takes after its title – a girl with golden hair in a pastoral setting in Scotland.^[3] Thus, it is one of many examples of Debussy's Impressionist music, since it conjures up images of a foreign place. His utilization of pentatonic scales throughout the piece achieves this, and by blending this in with harmonizing diatonic chords and modal cadences, he creates a folk-like tune.^[4] This prelude uses more plagalleading tones than any other piece composed by Debussy, and the prelude's melody alternates between conjunct and disjunct movement throughout.^[17]

The piece begins with its well-known opening theme consisting of three-note phrases,^[16] grouped together as one eighth note and two sixteenth notes. It finishes with chords that form a plagal cadence between bars 2 and 3,^[17] an element that is not featured in his previous preludes. The second part of the melody enters in bars 3–4, evoking a Scottish ballad or resembling a tune in the style of Edvard Grieg.^[16] The melody from the opening returns in bar 8 with added harmony in the left hand. At bar 19, the melody begins its ascent to the climax of the piece, gradually building up through the use of crescendo to propel it to peak at the end of bar 21. Near the end of bar 22, the melody decrescendos to the subsequent measure, where the theme of the climax is repeated an octave lower. A pianissimo drone-like part that moves in parallel motion—featuring consecutive fifths in some places—comes in at bars 24 to 27. In the next measure, the prelude's coda sees the return of the opening theme one last time—albeit at an octave higher—followed by the droning motif.^[13] Finally, the melody ascends in parallel movement and makes use of a final plagal leading cadence to get to the home key chord in root position. This cadence neither 'melodically anticipates the arrival pitch'^[17] nor does it include the tonic in the left hand. Thus, it has been described as 'the ideal harmonization of the plagalleading tone.'^[17] The melody ends with two arpeggiated octave chords (D♭ in the left hand followed by G♭ in the right), bringing the prelude to a close.^[13]

References

Footnotes

Claude Debussy A The Girl With The Flaxen Hair Analysis Summary

1. Bruhn, Siglind (January 1, 1997). Images and Ideas in Modern French Piano Music: The Extra-musical Subtext in Piano Works by Ravel, Debussy, and Messiaen. Pendragon Press. pp.166–172.
2. Roberts, Paul (2001). Images: The Piano Music of Claude Debussy. Hal Leonard Corporation. pp.242, 252, 256–257.
3. Kolb, Danielle. 'Recital Program'(PDF). UF School of Music. University of Florida. Retrieved August 29, 2012.
4. Weiss, Christopher (2003). 'Debussy Préludes Books I & II'(PDF). Ivory Classics. Ivory Classics Foundation. Retrieved August 29, 2012.
5. Briscoe, James R. (Autumn 1981). 'Debussy 'd'après' Debussy: The Further Resonance of Two Early 'Mélodies''. 19th-Century Music. University of California Press. 5 (2): 110–116. JSTOR746401.(registration required)
6. ↑ 'La Fille aux cheveux de lin'. Debussy.fr. Centre de documentation Claude Debussy. 2007. Retrieved August 28, 2012.
7. ↑ Lederer 2007, p.16.
8. 'Préludes (Premier livre)'. Debussy.fr. Centre de documentation Claude Debussy. 2007. Retrieved August 28, 2012.
9. ↑ Timbrell, Charles (August 1992). 'Claude Debussy and Walter Rummel: Chronicle of a Friendship, with New Correspondence'. Music & Letters. Oxford University Press. 73 (3): 399–406. doi:10.1093/ml/73.3.399. JSTOR735295.(registration required)
10. ↑ Hartmann, Arthur (2003). 'Claude Debussy as I Knew Him' and Other Writings of Arthur Hartmann. University of Rochester Press. Retrieved August 28, 2013.
11. ↑ 'Claude Debussy – Biography: 1910–1914 — From Préludes to Jeux'. Debussy.fr. Centre de documentation Claude Debussy. 2007. Retrieved August 28, 2012.
12. ↑ 'Debussy: 20 facts about the great composer'. Classic FM. Global Group. 2007. Retrieved August 29, 2012.
13. Lederer 2007, p.99.
14. ↑ Bustard, Clarke (January 27, 1997). 'Debussy Influence Felt Far And Wide In Musical Journey'. Richmond Times-Dispatch. p.E3. Retrieved August 29, 2013.(subscription required)
15. Lederer 2007, p.97.
16. Lederer 2007, p.98.
17. Day-O'Connell, Jeremy (Fall 2009). 'Debussy, Pentatonicism, and the Tonal Tradition'. Music Theory Spectrum. University of California Press on behalf of the Society for Music Theory. 31 (2): 248–255. doi:10.1525/mts.2009.31.2.225. JSTOR10.1525/mts.2009.31.2.225.(registration required)

Bibliography

• Lederer, Victor (2007). Debussy: The Quiet Revolutionary. New York: Amadeus Press. ISBN978-1-57467-153-7.

External links

• La fille aux cheveux de lin by Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli on YouTube

Claude Debussy A The Girl With The Flaxen Hair Analysis Poem