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Vincent Chang

Professor Silvers

Art of Music: An International Perspective

21 December 2018

The Grave of Couperin

Music is for the emotional. Music is for the creative. Music is for those who have a deep

desire to express something not possible in any other language. So, when you tell me that Ravel

wrote music without his own emotion, I find it extremely difficult to believe. Countless songs

from Ravel are written without his own life in mind. For instance, Pavane for a Dead Princess

was a mere dream he had about a girl dancing in a Spanish ballroom. Bolero was about an

incessant melody he stumbled upon while playing around on his piano. Where did he put his

identity into his music? Was he merely writing for fun, or was he desperately trying to show

something to his listeners? In order to better understand the way in which Ravel imprinted his

personality onto music, I will be uncovering the true intent and emotional value of the piano

suite, Le Tombeau de Couperin by Maurice Ravel to prove that he, in fact, did write for

expression, rather than for a job/fun.

Ravel’s life was not one to live for the weak of heart. Countless hardships and traumatic

events were thrown at him. As a child, Ravel was a pianist, after his father who was also a pianist

(Morris 2013, 44). His time in the Paris Conservatoire as a pianist was short-lived after he

became frustrated with his lack of success. He left the conservatory, only to return to study under

Gabriel Faure, focusing in on composition instead (Morris 2013, 44). He attempted three times to

win the Prix de Rome, a competition for young composers, however failed each time (Morris

2013, 45). This did, however allow him to come into the public eye. After these multiple failures,
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he began questioning the conservatory and their strict ways (Morris 2013, 45). Around his time

in the Societe Nationale (an organization meant for young rising composers in France), he was

being compared consistently with Debussy, at times even being considered a plagiarizer of

Debussy’s work (Morris 2013, 44). At this point, Ravel decided to leave the Paris Conservatoire,

as well as the Societe Nationale, starting up his own group, the Societe Musicale Independente,

to where he would be able to freely write music, not constrained by the French ties of either

organization (Morris 2013, 46). To even further ostracize himself from the French and their

conservative musical ways, he refused a prestigious award, the “Legion of Honor” award

publicly, causing an uproar (Morris 2013, 47-48). Despite this resentment towards French music

groups, Ravel had a strong sense of patriotism. During World War I, Ravel tried to enlist in the

army as a pilot, however was rejected for being underweight (Morris 2013, 46-47). He then

became a driver for the motor transports, where he witnessed the Battle of Verdun, one of the

longest, most gruesome battles of the war (Morris 2013, 47). His resolve to help the war efforts

began wavering, and he left the army with trauma-induced insomnia (Morris 2013, 48). In

September of 1916, Ravel became ill with dysentery, making it much more difficult to compose

(Morris 2013, 47). His mother died the following year as he was recovering from the illness,

leaving him both mentally and physically weak (Morris 2013, 47). Because of this, Ravel limited

his work to orchestra pieces only, typically that which were orchestrations of his old piano

works, such as Le Tombeau de Couperin, originally written for piano (Morris 2013, 47).

However, his insomnia worsened, and a car accident left him with Aphasia, a defect in the

comprehension/expression of language due to head injury, therefore he was unable to

write/communicate his ideas to others (Myers 2018). A surgery attempt to help him recover

ended in Ravel’s death (Myers 2018).

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To provide a bit of background on the piece Le Tombeau de Couperin, Ravel had written

this as a tribute for those he lost in the war (Freed 2018). The song is comprised of 6 movements,

each dedicated to somebody (Mawer 2016, 188). The title is named after Francois Couperin, a

French baroque composer (Ok 2008, 5). This was most likely done as a tribute to Baroque style

writing that Ravel takes from in the piece, as the six movements, Prelude, Fugue, Toccata,

Forlana, Menuet, and Rigaudon are all types of baroque forms or dances. Prelude was dedicated

to Lieutenant Jacques Charlot, who transcribed multiple works to piano for Ravel, such as Ma

Mere L’oye (Mawer 2016, 188). The Fugue was dedicated to Jean Cruppi who was the son of an

influential woman who helped secure the premiere of L’Heure Espagnole (Mawer 2016, 188).

The Toccata and Forlana dedicated to people he worked with in the war, Captain Joseph de

Marliave and Lieutenant Gabriel Deluc, who was also a close friend of Ravel (Mawer 2016,

188). The Menuet was dedicated to Jean Dreyfus, whose correlation to Ravel is still hazy

(Mawer 2016, 188). However, Ravel, in a letter to Roland Manuel, had included an inquiry about

his half-brother, who was Jean Dreyfus. He apparently had a war godmother (Marraine de

Guerre) whose stepson was Jean Dreyfus, so it is possible that Ravel had multiple indirect

connections with Jean Dreyfus, leading to his dedication that would touch the hearts of many

people he cared about (Rogers 2014). Finally, the Rigaudon was dedicated to Pierre and Pascal

Gaudin, also old friends of his (Mawer 2016, 188).

Le Tombeau de Couperin was written following his time in the war (Ok 2008, 1). As a

result, Ravel included many wartime connections in his writing. For instance, in the Menuet, the

continuous grace note figure, as well as high registers were written to emulate a birdsong (Morris

2013, 51). This birdsong was thought to have been correlated with the calm sounds Ravel

noticed after the bitter Battle of Verdun (Morris 2013, 51). Furthermore, Rigaudon represents the
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tension of war and its unsettled conflicts through the contrasting left and right-hand patterns

(Morris 2013, 50-51). The left repeated a four-measure pattern, creating an incessant sound that

doesn’t properly resolve (Morris 2013, 50-51). Moreover, the right hand’s melodic line does not

follow a four-measure phrase, creating a discontinuity between the harmony and the melody

(Morris 2013, 50-51). I interpreted this disconnect as a way to show the chaos that is war, for

war does not follow rhyme or reason at all times. At times people will act on their own accord,

and disarray ensues.

Another point that Ravel makes in his writing is to create his own way of writing,

separating himself from other French composers, such as Debussy, who he was constantly

compared with. Again, in Rigaudon, he also uses the contrasting right and left hands to showcase

his unique structure, combining basic forms of music with unconventional rhythmic patterns and

modes in non-sacred music (Morris 2013, 50-51). Another illustration of this is the ambiguity of

the meter within the Forlane. The dotted eighth – sixteenth note – eighth note pattern that marks

the beginning of the original theme constantly switches between being an anacrusis and starting

the measure (Morris 2013, 49-50). Despite being in 6/8 the whole movement, Ravel switches

between a 9/8 feel and a 6/8 feel (Morris 2013, 49-50). This is something interpreted to be an

inner conflict between Ravel’s upbringing of a strict French counterpoint teaching and his own

contemporary ideas. As a forlane is an old form of dance, the “displaced beats in the modern

adaptation of an archaic dance reflect the modern approach to structure in the early twentieth

century” (Morris 2013, 50) Another example of his unique writing would be in the Prelude. The

Prelude lacks a tonality yet follows the standard rounded binary (Richards 2015, 24) As is

becoming obvious, Ravel is utilizing basic structures of baroque music and twisting it with his

unconventional writing. In Baroque style writing, tonality is almost assumed in every piece,
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however Ravel uses both E minor and G major chords, circling around both tonics (Richard

2015, 26-28). It is only later that we find that the song is properly in E minor, when the

movement resolves (Morris 2013, 52).

In order to better understand the way in which Ravel imprinted his personality onto

music, I will be uncovering the true intent and emotional value of the piano suite, Le Tombeau

de Couperin by Maurice Ravel to prove that he, in fact, did write for expression, rather than fun.

In an attempt to grasp Ravel’s unique style of writing, my close reading analysis of Le Tombeau

de Couperin shows that Maurice Ravel indeed wrote to express inner turmoil rather than as a

mere pastime. Ravel had clouded his individuality in the places where individuality should be the

most difficult to find. He twisted standard forms that should be all similar and made it his own.

Rather than expressing excessive themes and motives in his music, Ravel used very few motives

and manipulated them to mean different things, as well as representing his identity in the ways

he interpreted forms. Many composers write melodic lines that have meaning, but his use of

modes in melodic lines were the least compelling in his music, instead drawing attention to

connections between time and harmony. I believe this to be a result of his influence from

Baroque teachings and Couperin’s writing, as Baroque music was very strict, as well as typically

that of absolute music, written for churches. Ravel knew no other way to write but had to throw

his story into the music he wrote, leading to his loopholes around the stiff method of Baroque-

style writing.
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Bibliography

Freed, Richard. "Le Tombeau De Couperin." The Kennedy Center. Accessed November 28,
2018. http://www.kennedy-center.org/artist/composition/3154.-

Mawer, Deborah. The Ballets of Maurice Ravel: Creation and Interpretation. New York, NY:
Routledge, 2016. Google Books.-

Morris, Anne. 2013. "A Bridge over Troubled Water: Le tombeau de Couperin." Musical
Offerings 4, No. 2 , 43-56. -

Myers, Rollo H. "Maurice Ravel." Encyclopædia Britannica. February 28, 2018. Accessed
November 29, 2018. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Maurice-Ravel.-

Ok, Yunae. 2008. “A Discussion of Maurice Ravel’s Masterpiece, Le Tombeau De Couperin.”

MM diss., Ball State University.-

Richards, Richard Jean. 2015. "Unraveling Ravel: The Prélude from Le Tombeau De
Couperin." Musical Insights 4, 19-33.

Rogers, Jillian. "Mourning at the Piano: Marguerite Long, Maurice Ravel, and the Performance
of Grief in Interwar France." Transposition 4 (July 15, 2014): 1-33.
doi:10.4000/transposition.739.