# Ravel's incredible orchestration



## emiellucifuge

Ive recently rediscovered the wonder of Maurice Ravel. The greatest thing about his music is the orchestration. He creates these fantastic landscapes of sound that can convey so many things. I belive this is shown best in his ballet, Daphnis et Chloe.










This is from that famous dance between the lovers. The famous melody is at the top in the woodwind. What really impresses me here is the sudden surge in the strings and harp, just before the fermata. Pure genius.


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## emiellucifuge

Slightly earlier, there is a dance in 7/4. Directly after the climax we get this repeated gesture. The rhythmic motif of the dance is hammered in ff before all goes quiet. Suddenly a trombone glissando sliding up and down followed by a small plink in thE pizz. Strings and woodwinds. A near comic effect - genius!

P.S i hope the score excerpts are big enough for you


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## emiellucifuge

Finally theres this incredibly violent sound. Ravel often uses glissandos in the strings for a subtle slidy effect after some suave melody, but here they stretch across entire ranges before making way for the ripping winds. Small acciaccaturas on each note in the woodwinds and brass remind of velcro being ripped apart.


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## Sebastien Melmoth

I'm very fond of his exquisite chamber work *Introduction et Allegro*:

http://www.amazon.com/20th-Century-French-Chamber-Music/dp/B003F1WGYE/ref=cm_cr-mr-title


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## Delicious Manager

I agree that Ravel was one of the greatest masters of orchestration. _Daphis et Chloë_ is a wonderfully sensual piece - maybe strange for a man who seems to have been so devoid of sexual desire or passion.

Other works which show his orchestration mastery are:

_Ma mère l'oye_ (Mother Goose)
_Le tombeau de Couperin_
_L'enfant et les sortilèges_ (one-act opera)
_L'heure espagnole_ (another one-act opera)
_Alborada del gracioso_
_La valse_
_Shéhérazade_ (the song cycle, rather than the early overture)
_Rapsodie espagnole_

Interesting, I have never cared for the orchestration Ravel made of Musorgsky's _Pictures from an Exhibition_; I don't think Ravel's fragrant French sensibility is compatible with Musogsky's very raw Russian style.


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## tdc

Ravel imo was THE master of orchestration, and his genius has been unparralled since. The 'colors' I can 'see' from his music are completely unique, not of this world, breathtaking, and original. These 'colors' are apparent in most of his works, but for me particularily apparent in his String Quartet in F, his Sheherazade works, and Daphnes and Chloe.


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## myaskovsky2002

*How many years*

did he take to compose Daphnis and Chloe? 3 years or more?

http://www.kennedy-center.org/calendar/?fuseaction=composition&composition_id=2308

Rimsky-Korsakov is much better...he was Ottorino Respighi master.

Martin


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## Delicious Manager

I'm not sure that the length of time taken to compose a piece has any relevance to its quality (or the quality of any of its constituent parts).


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## Manxfeeder

Thanks for the illustrations from the scores. It really makes it easy to see your points. Although it takes a little squinting


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## Petwhac

What is interesting is that Ravel almost always wrote for the piano and orchestrated after.
To really gain an insight into his genius compare the original piano versions of pieces like Le Tombeau or Mother Goose or Alborada with the orchestral versions. The orchestral versions sound so natural, colourful and imaginative while the piano versions are so 'pianistic'. A true master.


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## myaskovsky2002

*Ivry speak about him...*

http://www.nytimes.com/books/00/12/03/reviews/001203.03ridint.html

Was he gay?, is this so important in his music? Ivry says yes...and Bolero is a sexual act, he says!

Imagination? A lot! Speculations? A lot!

Just read it!

Martin


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## Delicious Manager

This is the first suggestion I have heard that Ravel was gay. I had always thought that Ravel was somehow 'asexual' and that's why I find his music so sexy - because THAT was his sexual release (for want of a better term). His music is among the most sensuous and sensual I know in the repertoire.

His sexuality is of no real relevance, of course, although people will always be interested in this sort of thing - it's human nature. The list of gay composers through history is a distinguished one and includes such notable names as Lully, Telemann, Handel (arguably), Corelli, Saint-Saëns, Tchaikovsky, Barber, Menotti, Griffes, Szymanowski, Skryabin, Sondheim, Poulenc, Britten, Tippett, Copland, Corigliano, Diamond and Rorem. It is of no consequence to their music, presumably.

It is not a new idea that Ravel's _Boléro_ is sexual in nature. Only ravel would know for sure and he's not around to ask.


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## World Violist

I've heard about the "Ravel is gay" theory, but I've also heard that he might have had a love affair with a woman, and since this is the only affair he's ever been hinted at having, I don't think there can really be anything conclusively said about his sexuality. He's one of the few composers where one can only listen to his music, not his sexuality.


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## myaskovsky2002

> It is not a new idea that Ravel's Boléro is sexual in nature. Only ravel would know for sure and he's not around to ask


.

I'm not worried about his sexuality but the fact he was hiding that from his parents and suddenly....could have an influence in his music. I don't think there such a thing as GAY music, Tchaikovsky was seriously gay and his music is quite Manish....LOL. Britten was also gay but lucky because times have changed....His music is quite energetic...

I like Ravel's music...I wasn't trying to say something negative about him...just "small talk"...BTW Scriabin wasn't gay (I read many books about that).

Martin, happy but not gay


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## tdc

Not that its really relevant, but I think the homosexual theories are probably incorrect. These quotes anyway seem to dispute it.

"....What place had Ravel for love? It seemed that there was none. ....One day I said to him: 'Maurice, you ought to marry. Nobody understands and loves children as you do. Get rid of your hermit life and have a real home.' Ravel replied: 'Love never rises above the licentious.' This 'licentiousness' he was willing, within moderation, to allow to some street-walking Venus; what remained beyond that would have turned his life upside-down and he did not find the idea an encouraging one.

"....One evening Ravel, as timid men sometimes do, asked a woman he had known for a long time to marry him. She burst out laughing and said to all and sundry: 'Ravel is crazy: he wants to marry me.' From that time he abandoned all idea of disrupting his solitude." [1] 
(Marguerite Long, in Long, [1973], p.121-122)

"You see, an artist has to be very careful when he wants to marry someone, because an artist never realizes his capacity for making his companion miserable. He's obsessed by his creative work and by the problems it poses. He lives a bit like a daydreamer and it's no joke for the woman he lives with. One always has to think of that when one wants to get married." [3] 
(Ravel to Manuel Rosenthal, quoted, and translated, by Nichols, [1987], p.35)

Rosenthal was surprised when Ravel arranged to meet him in a brasserie frequented by ladies: "....What he called 'ladies' were, in fact, prostitutes and indeed ... I saw several of these 'ladies' making signs at him; they knew him very well and he gave them a very friendly wave, saying 'Bonjour, bonjour'. I think it was a sort of outlet. ...It was very understandable and, for me anyway, completely refutes the suggestion people have made ... that he was homosexual. Not that it would have mattered in the least: he could have been homosexual without prejudice to his musical genius, but he wasn't." [4] 
(ibid. p.36)

http://www.maurice-ravel.net/love.htm


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## myaskovsky2002

*Interesting article...*

Nevertheless....

A guy with so much sex in his music cannot be "asexual"...A solitary? I just know gay people solitary...Why hide a woman when it is considered normal? No need. At that time being GAY was "bad", hiding a guy will be more understandable. Theories are theories anyways...As you have said who cares!

Let's enjoy his music!

let's close this chapter too!

Martin


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## Aggelos

Actually and Ravel's pupil, Leonidas Leonardi is very good. 
Check out a sample score.
http://www.lucksmusic.com/cat-symph/showdetailMain.asp?CatalogNo=08431
http://65.23.157.59/pdf/08431.pdf


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## kmisho

William Walton and Prokofiev were different types of composers but I would put them on a par with Ravel.


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## tdc

kmisho said:


> William Walton and Prokofiev were different types of composers but I would put them on a par with Ravel.


While in my personal opinion neither of those composers quite reached the level of Ravel, I am a big fan of both - William Walton is a composer I'm wanting to acquire a lot of new works from he is definetely great.


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## kmisho

tdc said:


> While in my personal opinion neither of those composers quite reached the level of Ravel, I am a big fan of both - William Walton is a composer I'm wanting to acquire a lot of new works from he is definetely great.


Perhaps not quite but pretty darn close. And when I say orchestration I mean more than mere technical proficiency but comprehension of the orchestra as an instrument in its own right. Prokofiev was perhaps the best brass composer ever as well as a supreme colorist. And I seriously doubt that Ravel was significantly more technically knowledgeable than Walton.


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## tdc

kmisho said:


> Perhaps not quite but pretty darn close. And when I say orchestration I mean more than mere technical proficiency but comprehension of the orchestra as an instrument in its own right. Prokofiev was perhaps the best brass composer ever as well as a supreme colorist. And I seriously doubt that Ravel was significantly more technically knowledgeable than Walton.


I could pretty much agree with this, especially on Prokofiev - he is very close. Those two both feature some incredibly breath taking colors in their works I don't hear often equalled. Though I'm not as educated yet on Walton - his works sound great to me, but I read he was mostly self-taught, so that is surprising you are saying his technical knowledge was equivalent to Ravels.


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## kmisho

tdc said:


> I could pretty much agree with this, especially on Prokofiev - he is very close. Those two both feature some incredibly breath taking colors in their works I don't hear often equalled. Though I'm not as educated yet on Walton - his works sound great to me, but I read he was mostly self-taught, so that is surprising you are saying his technical knowledge was equivalent to Ravels.


Ravel had a big bag of tricks. Not many other composers ever tried to capture the organ mutation sound as Ravel did in two sections of Bolero.

I've studied some Walton scores. Their simplicity on the page belies their sound. Walton played no instrument...except the orchestra.


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## KJohnson

Stravinsky said of Ravel, something like (don't remeber the axact quote) "Every time a composer is praised for good orchestration, one should be suspicious. Their music itself is often inferior. Such is the case with Rimsky Korsakov, Ravel, etc."

I don't know if it was jealousy, since Igor was quite young when he said that.. but it's an interesting opinion.


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## tdc

^ That seems odd, the things Ive read on Ravel's wiki page seem to indicate that Stravinsky really enjoyed Ravel's music:

"_Igor Stravinsky called Daphnis et Chloé "one of the most beautiful products of all French music..."

"Igor Stravinsky once referred to Ravel as "the most perfect of Swiss watchmakers", a reference to the intricacy and precision of Ravel's works..._."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maurice_Ravel

It also would appear they were friends, as Ravel wrote to Stravinsky after completing his Piano Trio in A minor:

"_writing to Igor Stravinsky, "The idea that I should be leaving at once made me get

through five months' work in five weeks! My Trio is finished_." "

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_Trio_(Ravel)


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## KJohnson

I don't find that odd at all. Stravinsky was one of the most self-contradictory composers of all time. Find me an opinion he ever expressed, I'll find you one completely contradicting it. Even in his own autobiography, which is probably the shortest autobiography I've read, he contradicts himself at every turn. Quite a curious character!


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