Review

Claude Debussy
Claire de Lune:

Arranged by Ralph Sauer


Vancouver, BC, Canada
Publisher: Cherry Classics Music
Date of Publication: 2015
URL: http://www.cherryclassics.com

Primary Genre: Solo Bass/Contrabass Trombone - with piano

Although the bass trombone repertoire has been expanding in recent years, the fact remains that some of the best composers in the history of Western Music went their entire careers having never written a solo for the instrument we all know and love. It has been a blank space in the repertoire painfully evident as students march into juries with the same handful of pieces. There is a lack of hands-on experience with the very composers that fill students’ music anthologies, a lack of experience that could easily lead to a purely theoretical view of their compositional language. It is in this context that we find Ralph Sauer’s arrangement of Claire de Lune for tuba (or bass trombone). It is another positive step towards filling those blank places in the repertoire while providing a context for students to go beyond their classroom knowledge of Debussy’s tonal language and learn to convey, in performance, the impressionist aesthetic he exemplified.
 
The arrangement is faithful to the homophonic texture of the original with the bass trombone taking over the melodic responsibilities of what would have been the pianist’s right hand. Concerning technique, the work demands little of the soloist, never extending above the staff and spending the majority of the time exploring the singing bass-baritone register. It’s a good thing too, because musically, this work demands great maturity. The melody, if not played with the utmost sensitivity, could easily become stagnant. The slowness with which Debussy’s composition moves demands a pristinely clear musical intention throughout the duration of every note and a beautiful sound that is easy on the ear. The soloist must be a decidedly deliberate chamber oriented performer. There is an ebb and flow to a good performance of Claire de Lune that is much easier to achieve when both of the pianist’s hands are commanded by the same brain. The fact that the downbeat chords are played by one performer while the melody is picked up by the trombonist necessitates a mature understanding and sensitivity to the reality that all music performed with more than one person is chamber music.
 
The unique requirements of this arrangement make it an interesting piece that could have a great educational use. The lack of technical demand may be ideal for creating space necessary for a student to begin exploring the kind of nonverbal musical communication required in great chamber music.

-Joseph Murrell
Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music