Debussy's Rêverie — the composer did not like this piece. In 1890, twenty-eight and short of money, he sold it to a publisher; fifteen years later, when they wanted to reissue it, he wrote to object, calling it something he had dashed off and of no consequence. It became one of the most played things he wrote. One hundred and one bars and four minutes fifty, held at one very light level throughout, with even the shortest note lasting a fifth of a second. The full piano score is on screen, note by note.
The composer wrote in to object to his own piece being reissued
In 1890 Debussy was twenty-eight, not yet known, and living on accompanying and teaching. He sold Rêverie outright to the publisher Fromont for a single payment, after which it was no longer his — the usual arrangement for a young composer then.
In 1905 Fromont planned a reissue and Debussy wrote to object. By then the Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune and Pelléas et Mélisande had made his name, and looking back at the early piece embarrassed him; the letter says, in effect, that he had dashed it off for money, that it was badly made, and that he regretted it. But the piece had been sold, and he could not stop it.
It became one of the most played things he wrote. For a great many people Rêverie is the first Debussy they meet — earlier even than Clair de lune.
It genuinely does not sound like the later Debussy. In 1890 he was still feeling his way, and this piece has well-behaved harmony, a clear tune and a square structure; that is probably what he disliked about it. It is also why it is easier to follow, easier to play and easier to live with than his mature work.
The code that lets the hosts dream is named after this piece
HBO's Westworld uses this piece: the code that gives the hosts dreams is called a reverie, named after it, and the cue returns whenever a host is touched by that code.
Ramin Djawadi arranged it for the series.
A piece that never applies pressure
The left hand lays down a rocking figure from the first bar and the right sets a slow melody on top — the two keep that relationship for four minutes fifty and never change it. There is no point at which the music asks for your attention.
Even the shortest note lasts 0.21 seconds: no fast runs, no grace notes, every note has room to land.
At 2:10 the piece nearly stops — bar 50 holds two notes in the whole bar, the emptiest measure in it. Afterwards the music lifts a step.
From 2:38 the key signature turns to four sharps, and the colour brightens and recedes at once; from 3:06 comes the thickest stretch, twenty to twenty-four notes a bar, the only place that sounds like effort.
At 3:27 the signature returns to one flat, the opening melody comes back with an extra layer beneath it, and the last bars disperse, leaving four notes.
This one is easy to leave on all evening: no loud passages, nothing sudden, a narrow dynamic range. It suits work, reading and going to sleep.
One hundred and one bars, and two changes of key signature
One hundred and one bars and one thousand three hundred and fifteen sounding notes, in 4/4 and F major, with no repeats and no grace notes. The score carries one hundred and nineteen dynamics, twenty-seven hairpins and one hundred and thirty-one pedal spans — more than one dynamic mark per bar.
The key signature changes twice on the page: four sharps from bar 59, none from bar 69, and back to one flat at bar 76. Bar 75 is the piece's only bar of 3/4, and the next returns to 4/4.
Bar counts run between two and twenty-four, averaging thirteen. Bar 20 with twenty-two and bars 69 to 73 with twenty to twenty-four are the two peaks; bar 50's two notes are the low point of the piece, with bars 49, 75, 99 and 101 at seven, six, five and four as the other clear dips.
The range is D1 to A6, five and a half octaves, and the shortest note lasts 0.208 seconds: nothing in the piece is shorter than a fifth of a second.
The difficulty is not letting it split into two layers
First, keep the left-hand figure even. It does the same thing throughout, and one note taking extra weight turns the accompaniment into a beat-keeper rather than a bed.
Second, do not stretch the right-hand melody too far. It invites a soulful reading, but the marked dynamics are almost all quiet ones; of the one hundred and nineteen dynamics in the score, hardly any are loud.
Third, change the pedal with the harmony. One hundred and thirty-one spans is dense, but the harmony moves often too, and over-pedalling blurs the modulations in the middle — which is the best part of the piece.
Fourth, the gap at bar 50. Two notes, and most players hurry on; hold it out.
Fifth, the thick stretch from bar 69. It is the one place that can take weight, and it is only five bars long; spend it and then withdraw.
The tempo follows the printed 80 to the quarter: bar 1 carries Andantino sognando with a metronome mark, so nothing is substituted. The source also holds over a hundred point-by-point tempo marks recording rubato, which normalisation folds away while the played rise and fall is kept.
We rate this 3 out of 5.
The same years, and what came later
This channel already has three Debussy pieces: Clair de lune, L. 75, written a year later and played just as often, and the two Arabesques, L. 66, from the year before. All four come from his twenties, and heard together they show him writing the same kind of thing for several years: a clear tune, a rocking accompaniment, harmony a little looser than his contemporaries'.
He became Debussy about a decade later — the harmony in the two books of Préludes and in Estampes is another matter entirely. None of those has been made yet.
