Maurice Ravel credited Edgar Allan Poe as his “teacher in composition.” From Poe, he learned that “true art is a perfect balance between pure intellect and emotion.”

Ravel was fond of toys, lots of mechanical toys. His cottage in Montfort-l’Amaury, southwest of Paris, was full of them, including a singing nightingale with a moving beak.

And he was a natty dresser. He once held up a performance for half an hour so that he would have the correct shoes. His music is as elegant and perfect as was his sartorial sense.

You can detect the mechanical influence in much of his music, including of course “Bolero” and the opening of the Piano Concerto in G. Miles Davis was obsessed with this classic recording by Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli:

The slow movement is as good as it gets. Nothing mechanical about it. It’s the soul at the heart of the machine.

Happy birthday, Maurice Ravel (1875-1937).