‘Unhealthy’ and ‘ugly’ music or a ‘compass pointing towards a purer art of superior quality’? The early reception of Debussy in Hungary (1900–1918)

Abstract

It is sufficiently well documented how Kodály and Bartók discovered the music of Claude Debussy in 1907, albeit Debussy’s music was not unknown in Hungary at least since the first performance of his String Quartet in the autumn of 1905. The present essay gives a survey of Debussy’s early critical reception in the Hungarian press from the first Budapest performances of his works until the obituaries of 1918; Debussy’s visit to Budapest at the beginning of December 1910 is discussed in detail. Though the majority of the press was not really open to Debussy’s new music, there were some supporters and knowledgeable enthusiasts of his art right from the beginning; moreover, the Royal Hungarian Opera House was going to première Pelléas et Mélisande as early as the 1908–1909 season but for unknown reasons this was postponed until 1926. By the end of the first decade of the 20th century, Debussy was acclaimed in Hungary as one of the most important composers of new music, though the lasting value of his art was then open to doubt. But his aesthetics was considered a model by the representatives of new Hungarian music and their devotees; as Kodály put it in 1918, ‘his compass points towards a purer art of superior quality’.