Ghost Light PodcastEpisode 10.12 – Painting with Sound: Debussy’s La Mer

Claude Debussy’s lifelong obsession with the sea found its voice in La Mer, three orchestral sketches that depict the shifting moods of the ocean. Though he chafed at the title, Debussy was a musical Impressionist to match the Impressionists of the visual art world, rendering his sound images through orchestral colors and expanded harmony, rather than oils and watercolors. In one of their Deep Dives, Jeff and Carol talk about how this “anti-symphony” overcame its inauspicious debut to become one of the seminal works of the twentieth century.