Achille-Claude Debussy

Achille-Claude Debussy (French: Achille-Claude Debussy, August 22, 1862 - March 25, 1918), French composer. He was the founder of Impressionist music and one of the most influential composers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. His representative works include the orchestral music "La Mer" and the overture to "Afternoon of a Faun", the piano suites "Bergamask Suite", "Image Collection", "Print Collection", etc.; and the peak of his creation is the opera "Pelléas et Mélisande". Debussy was born in a simple family with little cultural interest, but he showed his musical talent when he was 10 years old and entered the French Conservatoire of Music, the Paris Conservatoire. Debussy invented a variety of writing styles that took many years to mature, even though conservative professors at the conservatoire disapproved of Debussy's innovative approach. Before he achieved international fame in 1902, Debussy, who was almost forty years old, completed his only opera, Pelleas et Melisende. Debussy has been influenced by Impressionist art since his childhood. Under the influence of the French music tradition created by Massenet and other predecessors, he combined some characteristics of Eastern music, Spanish dance music and jazz, applied French Impressionist artistic techniques to music, and created his own unique harmony. His music had a profound impact on composers after him. Debussy is generally regarded as the representative of Impressionist music, although he himself disagreed and even tried to stay away from this title. Some writers such as E. Robert Schmitz and Cecil Gray also believe that Debussy is a "symbolist" rather than an "impressionist".