Member Since: 2/17/2006
Influences: Although Ravel is often compared to Claude Debussy (and indeed, the two composers did know and influence each other), Ravel was more a classicist than an impressionist, being more influenced by ancient mythology and the concertos of Mozart and Saint-Saëns than by Wagner, whose music he disliked. He was also drawn to jazz and music from Spain and Russia. A fastidious worker, he honed his works to perfection, leading to Igor Stravinsky's famous quip about "Ravel the Swiss Watchmaker". Ravel was a master orchestrator, who spent much of his time orchestrating piano works by himself and others, notably Debussy and Moussorgsky (whose Pictures of an Exhibition have become far more famous in Ravel's orchestration than in their original piano version). He worked with the famous choreographer Sergei Diaghilev in stage productions of his ballets Ma Mère l'Oye and Daphnis et Chloé.
Sounds Like: Ravel did not leave a very large oeuvre, but nearly all his compositions are masterworks. Among the most popular are the ballets Daphnis et Chloé (1912) and Ma Mère l'Oye (1915), the operas L'Heure espagnole (1907) and L'Enfant et les sortilèges (1925), the orchestral works Rhapsody Espagnole (1907), La Valse (1920), and the famous Boléro (1928), the song cycles Shéhérazade (1920) and Don Quichotte à Dulcinée (1932), the Tzigane for violin and piano/luthéal (1924) and the two jazz-inspired piano concertos (1931), one of them for the left hand alone. He also wrote excellent chamber works, and a number of piano pieces.The piano works of Ravel occupy a special place in the French repertoire. His greatest achievement, Gaspard de la Nuit (1908), is one of the supreme virtuoso challenges of all times. The other important works are Jeux d'eau (1901) , Miroirs (1905), Sonatine (1905), Valses nobles et sentimentales (1911), Le Tombeau de Couperin (1917), and the ever-popular Pavane pour une infante défunte (1899, orchestrated in 1910).
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