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Soul Music

Prelude a l'Apres Midi d'un Faune by Debussy

Soul Music

BBC

Music, Music Commentary

4.7831 Ratings

🗓️ 18 April 2018

⏱️ 28 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Claude Debussy's Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun speaks to artists of different kinds.

Jamaican poet Ishion Hutchinson recalls hearing it through an open window in Kingston Jamaica and being mesmerised by its beauty, but not knowing what it was, setting off on a quest to find out and to write a poem that captured his feelings about the piece.

Babak Kazemi was training to be a doctor in his home city of Tehran when he heard it for the first time. The piece changed his life and led him to abandon his medical studies in Iran to move to the UK to become a professional conductor and composer.

Artist Fiona Robinson specialises in interpreting Debussy's works on paper. She explains how she has been moved to visualise the Prelude, while Debussy's biographer Paul Roberts credits it with having changed classical music forever.

Katya Jezzard-Puyraud recalls how the music lifted her out of a difficult time after the birth of her first son and how she uses it now to help people with anxiety and stress to relax.

Series about pieces of music with a powerful emotional impact.

Producer: Maggie Ayre

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in April 2018.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

The Traitors is back and so is that mysterious cloaked figure with the familiar fringe.

0:06.7

Yeah, it's me.

0:07.9

And when you've watched Claudia in the castle, join me, Ed Gamble, for the official visualised companion podcast.

0:13.7

And remember, I'll be listening.

0:15.9

Okay?

0:16.7

No, seriously, I love it.

0:18.5

What a faithful.

0:19.7

We'll unpack betrayals and spill scandalous secrets

0:22.3

with celeb guests, traitors legends,

0:25.0

and murdered and banished players.

0:27.1

The Traitors Uncloat.

0:28.4

Watch on EyePlayer, listen for more on BBC Sounds.

0:32.2

This is the BBC. be safe.

0:40.3

My name is Ayshen Hutchinson. I am a poet. I was born in Port Antonio, Jamaica.

0:48.3

It was an afternoon walking home from the university campus back to my flat.

0:57.0

When I heard sounds coming from one of those homes near my flat, it was very beautiful and quiet,

1:06.0

very gentle sounds that drew me towards it.

1:13.6

And I stopped in front of the building trying to figure out what it was I was hearing.

1:21.6

And what I heard and didn't know at the moment was Debussy's setting of Marlamais' poem,

1:27.6

prelude to the afternoon of Fawn.

1:47.0

I was entranced. I was entranced.

1:48.0

The flutes, that beautiful mesmerizing flute music,

...

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