137. I must go down to the sea again: Debussy, La Mer

Who doesn’t love gazing at the sea? It’s something that brings out the meditative in all of us as we stare at it and think deep thoughts. Claude Debussy didn’t want us to think too hard – just to listen. In La Mer, he brings The Sea to us wherever we are, in all its beauty and wonder.

Total listening time 36 mins (podcast 11′, music 25′)

The music is here in full, played by The Hallé orchestra (from Manchester, UK) conducted by Mark Elder:

The recordings linked above are available to buy as high-quality downloads from Presto Music for under GB£5!

What do you think? Let me know with a comment below or leave a voice message! I’d love to hear from you!

There are more great episodes featuring the sea at Cacophony. Check out episodes: 29, 63 and 81 for music by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Benjamin Britten and Ethel Smyth. Also, the previous episode, 136, which takes us on a journey ending at Finisterre on the Atlantic coast of Spain.

This episode’s title is a line borrowed from an epic poem by Spike Milligan.

If you’d like to support Cacophony there are easy, great, ways:

– help with the costs of running it (and me) with a one-off contribution  or with a regular payment at ko-fi.com

– share this episode with someone you know

– share the 100 second trailer

– subscribe/ review and keep listening!

Thanks for listening!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *