Claude Debussy's Sonata for flute, viola, and harp (1915) is the second entry in a projected series of six chamber sonatas (of which the composer completed three). The sonata is at once evocative and emotionally ambiguous, though a great deal less harmonically adventuresome than its two companions; Debussy once remarked that he didn't know whether it "should move us to laughter or to tears. Perhaps both?" The sonata opens with a freely constructed movement marked Pastorale: Lento, dolce rubato. Debussy subjects six essential musical cells to a free variation treatment as the music unfolds. When he reprises these melodic strands, he does so without regard for their initial ordering, and yet with a clear dramatic impact. The atmosphere, seemingly relaxed, is nonetheless charged with a sense of repressed passion; the pause in the second measure, for instance, is positively bursting with psychological tension. The second movement, Interlude: Tempo di minuetto, recalls the Menuet of Debussy's Suite bergamasque (1890) in its vague implication—rather than explicit modeling—of a dance form; here, though, the rhythmic structure is more sharply defined. In the finale, marked Allegro moderato ma risoluto, the reason for Debussy's decision to abandon the sonata's original scoring—flute, oboe, and harp—becomes clear. Without the viola's passionate pizzicati, the finale would lose much of its essential character; indeed, its opening would be unrecognizable. Listening to such an abstract, non-representational movement, it is easy to understand why Debussy was moved on one occasion to refer to anyone who described such music as "impressionistic" as an "imbecile."

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