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Clair de lune
Debussy
Grade 8 5 min 66 BPM target
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Clair de lune looks easy. It is slow, comfortable under the hand, and its tune is never demanding. That is why so many play it before they can shape it. It began in the 1890s as part of the Suite bergamasque and was revised for publication in 1905, but it has long outgrown its suite. The title comes from a Verlaine poem, though the movement itself needs no words.
In practice it is a study in touch and pedal. A syncopated melody floats over rippling chords. The only real motion is in the central Animé, where the texture climbs and must then dissolve back into stillness. Sentimentality ruins it, and so does excessive caution. The balance between the hands has to stay true, and the pedalling must colour the harmony without clouding it. As a first serious Impressionist piece it teaches more about sound than many harder works, and it changes how you hear the instrument.
About this edition
Clair de lune, from Suite bergamasque. Urtext edition typeset by Pierre Gouin, Les Éditions Outremontaises (2007), from IMSLP[1], licensed CC BY-SA 4.0[2]. Cropped and de-skewed for display; the adapted images are distributed under the same licence.
From the journal
The plan covers the whole piece, and the order changes as you practise it.
Start with the piece you have always wanted to play
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