Born in Ciboure, France, and raised in Paris, Maurice Ravel (1875–1937) grew up in a tornado of influence. Inspired by his contemporaries—poet Arthur Rimbaud and composers Erik Satie and Claude Debussy, to name a few—Ravel became one of the defining composers of the early 20th century. Though he’s often labeled an impressionist (a term he resisted), Ravel can be seen as the figurehead for the early decades of the century: an era defined by extreme change, uncertainty, and a responsive artist community with pencils, brushes, and batons ablaze. To mark the 150th anniversary of Ravel’s birth, Seong-Jin Cho performs his complete piano works: 13 pieces that span 1893 to 1917 and show the blossoming, ingenuity, and resolve of one of our finest composers. 

Ravel began studying piano in 1882 with French composer and pianist Henri Ghys, a friend of fellow composer Emmanuel Chabrier, and in 1888 Ravel studied with pianist Émile Decombes, who had taught Erik Satie. At age 7, Ravel was already in the lineage of great French composers and his influences expanded as the piano quickly consumed him. Later, learning under Gabriel Fauré (who had studied under Camille Saint-Saëns) at the Paris Conservatory, Ravel added composition to his coursework. 

Ravel’s first surviving piano composition, Sérénade grotesque, hints at some of the composer’s moods to come. Written in 1893 when Ravel was only 18, Sérénade grotesque has the temperament of a teenager: unsure at points, overly sincere, and rebellious. At this age, Ravel was growing into a dandy—absorbing literature, music, and fine arts with rapture. As Charles Baudelaire defined it, “Dandyism is above all a burning need to fashion for oneself an originality that is contained within the outer limits of what is acceptable.” Ravel gravitated to the works of Baudelaire, Rimbaud, and Poe, and found himself in a moment of self-fashioning, finding his identity among artists with wild hearts and fiery eyes. Menuet antique, too, reflects this period in Ravel’s youth. Still studying at the Paris Conservatory, Ravel wrote Menuet antique at 20 and later orchestrated it, in 1929. 

With Pavane pour une infante défunte, or Pavane for a Dead Princess, Ravel continued experimenting with counterpoint and balance while gesturing broadly to 16th-century Spanish Renaissance dances called pavanes. He also caught a glimpse of future strife when audiences were baffled by the title. “Do not attach any importance to the title,” Ravel urged. “I chose it only for its euphonious qualities. Do not dramatize it. It is not a funeral lament for a dead child, but rather an evocation of the pavane which could have been danced by such a little princess as painted by Velázquez.” Ravel’s mother, to whom he was close, was Basque, and her bravado inspired much of his work, particularly later in his career once he was able to visit Spain. 

Jeux d’eau, which roughly translates to “Water games,” was composed in 1901 and dedicated to Fauré. In the score, Ravel included a quote from poet Henri de Régnier: “Dieu fluvial riant de l’eau qui le chatouille” (River god laughing at the water that tickles him). With luscious flourishes and dramatic flair, the piece captures a sonic environment, a feat that would define Ravel’s style. 

Two years later, Ravel began working on the first movement of Sonatine as an entry for a “Musical Competition,” announced in the Paris cultural journal the Weekly Critical Review with the instructions: “Compose the first movement of a Piano-forte Sonate in F sharp minor, not to exceed 75 bars in length.” The competition—and its prize of 100 francs—was soon called off. But Ravel continued developing the piece, embracing the prescribed structure.  

One of Ravel’s iconic works, Miroirs, is a five-part suite with each part dedicated to a friend, all fellow members of the avant-garde collective Les Apaches, which hosted weekly meetings through the mid-1910s. The dedicatees include poet Léon-Paul Fargue, pianist Ricardo Viñes, and painter Paul Sordes. Ravel surrounded himself with artists and intellectuals and drew inspiration from their works. The five movements are distinct but blend like an impressionist painting. Looking back on his work, Ravel said, “The Miroirs form a collection of pieces for piano which mark a change in my harmonic development pronounced enough to have upset those musicians who till then had had the least trouble in appreciating my style.” Describing the realistic chimes in “La vallée des cloches” and the fluttering of moths in “Noctuelles,” biographer Roger Nichols argues that “realism is achieved at the expense of orthodox harmonic practice.”  

Both Sonatine and Miroirs were completed in 1905—the year of L’affaire Ravel. In 1900, 1901, 1902, 1903, and 1905, Ravel competed for the Prix de Rome, France’s most prestigious competition for emerging composers. The closest he got was in 1901, when he won second place. In 1905, he was sent home before the final round. Later, it was revealed that all six finalists were students of one of the judges and a teacher at the Paris Conservatory, Charles Lenepveu. As controversy spread, the director of the conservatory was replaced by Fauré, and Ravel never competed again. By the time Sonatine and Miroirs debuted in 1906, the 31-year-old had successfully premiered the Shéhérazade song cycle and his String Quartet, bolstering an already bounding career.  

Ravel turned to Aloysius Bertrand’s macabre collection of prose poems Gaspard de la Nuit for his composition of the same name. Like Poe, Bertrand described unfamiliar, disturbing scenes. The three movements of Ravel’s piece, “Ondine,” “Le gibet,” and “Scarbo,” are poems in Bertrand’s collection. Ravel viewed his pieces as faithful adaptations, writing, “My ambition is to say with notes what a poet expresses with words.” 

The first movement, “Ondine,” is about a water nymph, whose gloom and pull are inescapable. Ravel echoes the whooshing waters of Jeux d’eau and the third movement of Miroirs, “Une barque sur l’océan,” while describing the underlying uneasiness of Bertrand’s poem.  

“Le Gibet” starkly contrasts “Ondine.” The speaker of the poem searches for the source of the sounds ringing in the air, concluding, “It is the bell tolling from a town far beyond the horizon and the body of a hanged man that glows red in the setting sun.” The B-flat octave ostinato rings throughout the entire piece, eerily mimicking the bells. Inquiring voices rise above, while the left hand sinks.  

“Scarbo” describes a goblin who appears in the speaker’s nightmares and spins around the room: “How often have I seen him alight on the floor, pirouette on one foot and roll through the room like the spindle fallen from the wand of a sorceress!” Ravel’s piece, known and feared for its technical difficulty, is a lot like Bertrand’s goblin—elusive, taunting, and frighteningly fast.

In 1909, the journal La Revue Musicale commissioned six composers to mark the centenary of Franz Joseph Haydn’s death. The works included Claude Debussy’s Hommage à Haydn, Paul Dukas’ Prélude élégiaque, and Ravel’s Menuet sur le nom d’Haydn. Ravel used Haydn’s name, assigning each letter to a musical note—H with B natural, Y with D natural, and N with G natural—to create a five-note motif that runs through the brief minuet. 

Inspired by Schubert’s many waltzes, Ravel composed Valses nobles et sentimentales, which contains eight pieces that bounce and ramble, seemingly unconstrained by the Viennese waltz’s rigorous structure. Through dissonance, rhythmic play, and sudden changes in dynamics, Ravel offers moments of lush respite and whisks them away.  

Asked by Fauré to compose a piece for the women at the Paris Conservatory that could help them with sight-reading practice, Ravel composed the simple and lovely ditty Prélude in 1913.  

À la manière de Borodine and À la manière de Chabrier appeared in Italian composer Alfredo Casella’s second volume of pastiches, published in 1914. Written in the French countryside, where Ravel found respite after a bustling year, these small pieces pay tribute to two of Ravel’s favorite composers. The first, a waltz infused with chromaticism, is a fitting ode to Borodin’s style. The second mimics Chabrier’s tempestuous flourishes: reckless arpeggios grounded by a thumping bass.  

On August 3, 1914, Germany declared war on France. The following day, Ravel wrote to his friend Maurice Delage: “I feel that from hour to hour things are crumbling...and so as not to hear this anymore, I’m working. Yes, I’m working; and with the assurance, the lucidity of a madman. But, meanwhile, depression is at work too. And suddenly there I am weeping over the sharps and flats!... It’s been going on for four days now, since the call to mobilize.”

Unlike many of his friends and colleagues, Ravel was eager to join the war. Deciding to enlist only days after Germany's declaration, Ravel was distraught to find out he did not meet the physical requirements to join the front line. Eventually, on March 14, 1916, Ravel was sent to Verdun as a lorry driver. Ten months later, Ravel’s mother died, and shortly after, Ravel was temporarily discharged. 

Forever altered by his work in the war, Ravel demonstrated a new sense of adventure and curiosity. Satie marveled at this in a letter: “How Ravel has changed! Don’t you think so? His attitude is comic in the extreme...and farcical! Let’s hope it’s not serious. His ‘militarism’ is following him into civilian life, don’t you feel? It distresses me greatly—greatly. Such a great artist!” Ravel, by contrast, wrote “after a period of service that has been extremely active and adventurous, I am absolutely exhausted, but happy that I have not left any pieces of myself behind and to have lived through moments that were worth the trouble.” Despite his attention being drawn elsewhere, Ravel managed to complete Le tombeau de Couperin in 1917. 

Le tombeau de Couperin was conceived before the war and had been percolating in Ravel’s mind during his time as a soldier. The piece, Ravel said, is “directed less in fact to Couperin himself than to French music of the 18th century.” Over the six movements, Ravel blends Baroque sensibilities with his own sound, resulting in a piece that feels outside of time. Even the second movement, with its Baroque counterpoint and lack of sustained notes, is a dreamy, Ravel-esque fugue.  

After he completed Le tombeau, Ravel dedicated each movement to a friend who had died in the war. He was later scrutinized by critics for his attributions. How could a song of mourning be so jovial? Ravel shrugged off their sanctimony. 

Tombeau would be Ravel’s last work for solo piano. He would go on to compose Boléro, orchestrate Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, tour America, and exchange ideas with George Gershwin. One hundred fifty years after Ravel’s birth, it is a thrill to hear the complete solo piano works chronologically and follow the development of an inimitable compositional voice. —Tess Carges