Toward the end of the nineteenth century, a new movement called impressionism took shape in both art and music. In both genera, rather than being focused on clarity and structure, impressionist works were interested in creating a more general tone or mood. In art, this meant moving away from realism; in music, this meant moving away from functional harmonic progression.
In some ways, impressionism marks a transition period between Romanticism and early modernism. Impressionism appeared in France, with musicians in particular consciously trying to distance themselves from the German traditions that had dominated music for the past 300 years.
A classically trained French composer, Saint-Saëns often eschewed traditional functional progression. His Danse Macabre, which notably marks the debut of the xylophone in Western music, spends its main melody switching from a minor "i" chord to a minor "vii" chord. The "Aquarium" movement from Carnival of the Animals includes a transitional phrase that sequences down dimished chords across all twelve tones of the chromatic scale.
Debussy summed up the impressionist attitude to music in 1900, saying, "It is not necessary for music to make people think; it would be enough if it made them listen." Debussy was largely influenced by music from Spain and Asia, and drew on practices from the history of Western music. His "Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun" is a wandering, semi-tonal piece, and his "Engulfed Cathedral" represents the French monastery of Mont Saint-Michél with medieval-style perfect intervals.
Like Brahms, Dukas was a perfectionist who was noted for destroying many of his own compositions when unsatisfied with them. He is most famous for a tone poem called "The Sorcerer's Apprentice," based on a ballad by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe about an enchanted broom and made famous by Walt Disney's 1940 film Fantasia.
Danse Macabre
Organ Symphony
Carnival of the Animals
Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune
La Cathedrále Engloutie
The Sorcerer's Apprentice