Roussel's art song Ode à un jeune gentilhomme is an exemplary machine chinoise for the consistency with which harmonic colors and chords identified with the pentatonic scale define its tonal landscape. Articulating a complete pentatonic scale in every measure, the accompaniment all but masks underlying suggestions of classical harmony and tonal progression. No less notable are several historical factors that set off Roussel's achievement in this piece from comparable works by Debussy, Ravel, and Falla. It was composed in 1907 (dated 9 March), and if Roussel, a student of d'Indy and a professor at the Schola Cantorum, had heard authentic Chinese music before 1907, either at the international expositions in Paris or as a French naval officer in the Far East, there is no biographical or stylistic evidence linking the song to these resources or to published documents, such as Benedictus’ transcriptions, describing or transcribing exotic music brought to Paris in 1889 and 1900. Nevertheless, as an informed Parisian composer on the cusp of a prolific career, he was certainly aware of attempts by other composers to find musical expression with pentatonic and whole-tone scales. Moreover, his interest in Chinese poetry limited to H.P. Roché's French translations of Chinese poetry collected by the English oriental scholar Herbert Giles was eventually to give rise to three sets of Chinese songs, each consisting of a pair of song settings. Only the initial song of the first pair, published as Op. 12 in 1908, however, relies almost exclusively on the pentatonic scale and other musical ideas that might be associated with Chinese music. The harmonic language of the second, Amoureux séparés, places pentatonic sonorities in a harmonic style that reverts to the freely dissonant chords of his music before 1907. Indeed, the restricted pentatonic language of Ode sets off this piece as a unique tonal experiment in Roussel's oeuvre, and one might be led to miss its innate musical qualities, if not its significance for the development of Roussel's style. Basil Deane suggests that its distinction surpasses the critical value of songs published earlier. Of Réponse d'une épouse sage, the second Chinese song of Roussel's next set, Op.35 (1927), Deane writes that its achievement deserves extended study. Roussel's Ode reveals characteristic treatment of his pentatonic material and text setting that warrants close examination.