THE LITTLE NEGRO Clarinet Quartet

THE LITTLE NEGRO Clarinet Quartet - Arrangement by Everardo García

The piece “The Little Negro,” originally titled “The Little Nigar,” was written as part of Théodore Lack’s piano method commission in 1909 by composer and pianist Claude Debussy. He was born on August 22, 1862, in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France, and died on March 25, 1918, in Paris. “The Little Nigar” was first published that same year by Éditions Alphonse Leduc in Paris. The subtitle describes it as a cakewalk; it is reminiscent of Golliwogg’s “Cakewalk” from his Children’s Corner, a piano suite he had composed a year earlier. In 1934, it was again published as a single piece, now with an added reprise and titled “The Little Negro” with the subtitle “Le petit nègre.” More recently, the piece has also been published under the title “Le petit noir” (The Little Negro). Although the piece was written for piano, numerous transcriptions have been made for various instruments.

Debussy regularly sought out exotic influences. In The Little Negro, he alluded to banjo chords and drums, influenced by American minstrel shows. The piece, marked allegro, begins with a first theme featuring “jazzy syncopations” in 2/4 time, in the then-popular ragtime style. This is followed by a lyrical passage, marked espressivo and pianissimo (very soft), which leads to the return of the first section. The first theme leans toward the pentatonic and is accompanied by a chromatic sequence of broken minor thirds.