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Ravel intended the piece to be played extremely slowly – more slowly than almost any modern interpretation, according to his biographer Benjamin Ivry.

The critic Emile Vuillermoz complained that Ravel's playing of the work was " unutterably slow.

" However, the composer was not impressed by interpretations that plodded.

After a performance by Charles Oulmont, Ravel mentioned to him that the piece was called " Pavane for a dead princess ", not " dead Pavane for a princess ".

When asked by the composer-conductor Manoah Leide-Tedesco how he arrived at the title Pavane pour une infante défunte, Ravel smiled coyly and replied, " Do not be surprised, that title has nothing to do with the composition.

I simply liked the sound of those words and I put them there, c ' est tout ".