"There is no theory. You have only to listen. Pleasure is the law. I love music passionately. And because l love it, I try to free it from barren traditions that stifle it. It is a free art gushing forth — an open-air art, boundless as the elements, the wind, the sky, the sea. It must never be shut in and become an academic art."
Claude Debussy was a French composer whose music had a major influence on modern composition. He is associated with the impressionist movement in music, though he rejected the label. His works include Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune and La Mer.