Debussy's Increasing Visibility and Influence

Among the signs that Debussy had emerged within the musical establishment, a modest one was his first role in an official organization. He was appointed as an alternate juror for the concours of the Ville de Paris—the same concours he had almost entered in 1884 (in order to avoid going to Rome), in which he would have competed with Vincent d'Indy. On this jury, he would meet up with, of all people, his former Prix de Rome colleagues Vidal, Leroux, and Marty.

In the early months of 1904, Debussy would strike up a friendship with Louis Laloy, a man of about thirty whose background was different from that of his usual friends. A student at the École normale supérieure who had passed his aggregation exam, Laloy was about to defend his doctoral dissertation on an esoteric subject, Aristoxenus of Taranto. He had also attended the Schola Cantorum and had devoted some articles to Debussy in La revue musicale that were quite different from what most critics had to say. He is the only person affiliated with a university ever to have become part of Debussy's entourage, as the composer had a certain distrust of people who were “too well informed.” Laloy's interest in Rameau and his curiosity about East Asian music, which impressed Debussy more than did Edmond Bailly's dabbling in the subject, certainly helped to bring them together. This friendship, while not compensating emotionally for the estrangement from Pierre Louÿs, would be important to Debussy from this point forward.

The first weeks of the year would be filled with two premieres, which drew limited audiences, as in the past. On 9 January, under the auspices of the Société nationale, Ricardo Viñes premiered the Estampes, a set of three pieces that Durand had just published. On the whole, the critics preferred “Pagodes,” whereas the audience demanded an encore of “Jardins sous la pluie.” As for “La soirée dans Grenade,” it elicited a comical comparison similar to others already seen issuing from the critics’ pens: “We could not help but recall Liszt's La clochette, and at every turn, the composer of the Rapsodies showed off…