> “There is no theory. You merely have to listen. Pleasure is the law.” Except Debussy had a musical education that included theory from the best teachers in F

> “There is no theory. You merely have to listen. Pleasure is the law.” Except Debussy had a musical education that included theory from the best teachers in France and clearly understood the material. Plus first hand experience sight reading Wagner's operas and probably anything else he could get his hands on. Someone with that level of education and pianism can claim to forget about theory. Then they will go on write Reflets dans l'eau. Meanwhile, someone who has never studied music theory at all and learns to play the electric guitar will go on to write something like Purple Haze. They both start with a prominent tritone. But Hendrix didn't have enough schooling to take it in the harmonic direction that Debussy did. And Debussy had too much education to forgo sophisticated harmonic juxtapositions and constrain himself to timbre/melody. Edit: Actually I'm thinking of Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune where the flute line moves up and down within a tritone. Either way, sophisticated harmony and form that has obvious connections with much of the music Debussy analyzed in theory classes.