Ravel: Pavane pour une infante défunte

Maurice Ravel was at Paris Conservatory receiving lessons from Gabriel Fauré when he composed the solo piano work Pavane pour une infante défunte (Pavana for a Dead Princess). It was the year 1899 and the author was 24. Published the following year, the work did not captivate the attention of pianists and connoisseurs. Naturally, it was just the second piece for piano the youthful composer had sent to publication. So, to gauge its reception he had to wait until 1902 when the Spanish pianist Ricardo Vignes premiered it in April of that year arousing the enthusiasm of the audience. Today, along with Bolero, the work is one of Ravel's most famous pieces.

However, for a time the composer did some efforts to disown the piece, which he considered rather "poor" in his form. In addition, he felt it to be too clearly oriented around the musical language of who had been his first "inspiration" at the beginning of his career, the French musician Emmanuel Chabrier. Despite all of this, given the original favorable reception, eight years later Ravel did write a version for orchestra.

Maurice Ravel, in 1906
(1875 - 1937)

The pavana, a dance
The pavana is a dance. A slow dance that was regularly danced in the Spanish courts of the 16th and 17th centuries. According to scholars, the work of Ravel tries to evoke the elegance of a courtly reception as well as the graceful movement of a Spanish princess, an infanta, while performing the delicate dance pirouettes, which simulates the movements of a peacock.

As was to be expected for a young author, Ravel followed the prevailing style in central Europe at the end of the 19th century, which showed particular enthusiasm for Spanish airs, to which so many other authors surrendered: Lalo with the Spanish Symphony, Chabrier with his rhapsody España, Glinka with his Jota Aragonesa, to name a few. Ravel himself will continue the trend, later, with his Spanish Rhapsody.

However, when Ravel was asked about the origin of the title, he merely replied that he loved the way the words sounded, and that was all. The piece, a little more than six minutes long, is slow, but not as much, as the affable Ravel once told a quiet performer, whom he reminded the piece was called "pavana for a dead princess" and not "dead pavana for a princess".

The rendition, calm and balanced, is from the French maestro Philippe Entremont.