slevatich's review against another edition
4.0
Exceptionally well considered writing about Debussy's music, evocative and insightful, and that ultimately carries my positive opinion here, but in general I prefer a bit more contextual detail to supplement - this was reaaally focused on the music. Rare to find a book that meets you more at a deeper level of music theory understanding, which I do appreciate, but feel like books as a medium struggle with music nonfiction without very well curated and accessible supplemental audio guides so leaning more towards reflections on how music relates to situational context plays better to its strengths maybe. Was neat to reflect on how stylistic advancements were so dependent on access (privileged) to cross cultural exchange (worlds fairs type events) but the book was not so interested in broader conversations. The real thing that bummed though was the style is ironically pithy and dry - the sentences were positively stuffed full of clauses and untranslated french that maaaaybe works for a certain audience. But imagine... the opposite of a debussy piece and you'll have a good sense of the writing style here.
Pithy one liner version: the music writing was sharp but stylistically fell a bit flat *rimshot*
Thanks for coming to my annual fall classical music nonfiction ted talk
Pithy one liner version: the music writing was sharp but stylistically fell a bit flat *rimshot*
Thanks for coming to my annual fall classical music nonfiction ted talk
juliemichellereads's review against another edition
4.0
A very concise book about the music of Claude Debussy. This is certainly not a book that someone without a good amount of music theory under their belt could undertake and even myself as a trained musician had to stop sometimes and reread.
Going into the book I did not have much of an appreciation for the man nor did I care deeply for his music. This book certainly forces you to listen to his music a lot. Which I did (begrudgingly to some extent but hopeful to discover his sound more). In fact if you’re not listening to the pieces the author describes as you go along with the reading I don’t think it would be much help at all.
At the very least this book helped to respect his music more... though still not my personal cup of tea. I do admire his cleverness and ambition to create something different. He was indeed a genius in his own right. Perhaps one day I too will grow and mature to love his music.
I do wish it would have gone more into the man of Debussy and his personal life. But I understand that was not the intent of the authors take in writing the biography.
All in all a good read. Wish I could give 5 stars but only giving 4 solely for the fact that I wish we knew more of the human side into his life.
Going into the book I did not have much of an appreciation for the man nor did I care deeply for his music. This book certainly forces you to listen to his music a lot. Which I did (begrudgingly to some extent but hopeful to discover his sound more). In fact if you’re not listening to the pieces the author describes as you go along with the reading I don’t think it would be much help at all.
At the very least this book helped to respect his music more... though still not my personal cup of tea. I do admire his cleverness and ambition to create something different. He was indeed a genius in his own right. Perhaps one day I too will grow and mature to love his music.
I do wish it would have gone more into the man of Debussy and his personal life. But I understand that was not the intent of the authors take in writing the biography.
All in all a good read. Wish I could give 5 stars but only giving 4 solely for the fact that I wish we knew more of the human side into his life.
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