The music

The Music presents a group of idealized female figures gathered on a cloud set against a deep blue background, with a central pale figure in white playing a large stringed instrument and a radiating halo behind her head. The surrounding figures wear draped garments in teal, brown, orange, and blue, forming a circular composition that includes a nude figure at the lower left and a wind-instrument player at the lower right. Bouguereau’s handling is the hallmark of Academic realism: smooth, polished flesh, carefully modeled drapery, and a luminous palette that contrasts warm skin tones with the cool blue sky.