Ravel's "Russian" Period: Octatonicism in His Early Works, 1893-1908

Abstract

The octatonic scale has provided composers an important alternative to common diatonic practice since the middle of the nineteenth century. Scholars have traced a direct line of transmission with respect to octatonic writing passing from Liszt, through Rimsky-Korsakov, to Stravinsky. But octatonicism also figures prominently in the music of Maurice Ravel, and several works from the first fifteen years of his career implicate Ravel directly in the octatonic legacy, simultaneously bearing the influence of nineteenth-century chromatic harmony as practiced by Liszt and Rimsky-Korsakov and anticipating methods of octatonic partitioning heretofore considered specifically Stravinskian innovations.