Claude debussy pronunciation

The next installment in our French Composers’ Names series might be one of the most famous French composers: Claude Debussy.

One could see two difficulties in pronouncing his last name: the unaccented e, and the u. When a French e is unaccented and not in front of a double consonant (as in belle, steppe, gemme, etc. in which case it will sound like an è), its sound is very similar to an American [uh] sound, with a little bit more lips involved (protruded). We have already covered the u sound in this series when we talked about Tristan Murail. Remember that you have to pronounce an [ee] sound with your lips protruded. The -ssy is really easy for English speakers—no problem here.

Alright, here it is:

Link to MP3 – Claude Debussy | Get Claude Debussy sheet music!

Irrelevant trivia: Claude Debussy used to be on our 20 Francs bank notes before the Euro was adopted on January 1^st, 2002. As a kid I was fascinated by this small brown note, that also represented a lot of pocket money (~US $3)!

Note the background, reminiscent of his famous symphonic sketches…

22/08/1862 - 25/03/1918

Claude Debussy was a French composer who was very influential at the end of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s. He is often labelled as the first impressionist composer, borrowing the terminology from the 19th century style of French painting, although Debussy himself refused and detested the label.
Debussy's full name was Achille Claude Debussy and he used different variations of his name throughout his life. He began his career by using Achille-Claude (in its hyphenated version) to sound more prestigious and occasionally split his surname into de Bussy. However, he then reverted to signing off only as Claude Debussy.
The correct pronunciation of Claude Debussy in French is Klod Deh-boo-see. The "o" sound in -Klod is a closed sound and it is pronounced similarly to the "o" in the word "story". The "e" in Debussy is rather complicated to transcribe without IPA because while it is an "e" sound, it also sounds similar to a "uh" sound. 

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