Igor Stravinsky Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Igor Stravinsky - Essay ExampleStravinsky left Russia for the first time in 1910, going to Paris to get wind the premiere of his ballet Loiseau de feu (The Firebird) (Craft 20). During his stay in the city, he composed three major works for the Ballets Russes-Loiseau de feu, Petrushka (1911), and Le sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring) (1913). Eventually Stravinskys music was noticed by Serge Diaghilev, the director of the Ballets Russes in Paris. He commissioned Stravinsky to write a ballet for his theater so in 1911, Stravinsky traveled to Paris. That ballet ended up cosmos the famous LOiseau de Feu. However, because of World War I and the October Revolution in Russia he moved to Switzerland in 1914.The first of Stravinskys major stylistic periods (excluding some early modest works) was inaugurated by the three ballets he composed for Diaghilev. The ballets have several shared characteristics they are scored for extremely large orchestras they use Russian folk themes and moti fs and they bear the chump of Rimsky-Korsakovs imaginative scoring and instrumentation.The first of the ballets, Loiseau de feu, is notable for its unusual introduction (triplets in the low basses) and sweeping orchestration. Petrushka, too, is distinctively scored and the first of Stravinskys ballets to draw on folk mythology. and it is the third ballet, The Rite of Spring that is generally considered the apotheosis of Stravinskys Russian Period (Hill 45-46). Other pieces from this period include Renard (1916), Histoire du soldat (A Soldiers Tale) (1918), and Les Noces (The Wedding) (1923).The next phase of Stravinskys compositional style, slightly cooccur the first, is marked by two works Pulcinella 1920 and the Octet (1923) for wind instruments. Both of these works feature what was to become a hallmark of this period that is, Stravinskys return, or flavor back, to the classical music of Mozart and Bach and their contemporaries. This neo-classical style involved the abandonmen t of the large orchestras demanded by the ballets. In these new works, written roughly between 1920 and 1950, Stravinsky turns by and large to wind instruments, the piano, and choral and chamber works.Some larger works from this period are the three symphonies the Symphonie des Psaumes (Symphony of Psalms) (1930), Symphony in C (1940) and Symphony in Three Movements (1945). The pinnacle of this period is the opera The Rakes Progress completed in 1951. This opera, written to a libretto by Auden and based on the etchings of Hogarth, encapsulates everything that Stravinsky had perfected in the earlier 20 years of his neo-classic period. The music is direct but quirky it borrows from classic tonal harmony but also interjects surprising dissonances it features Stravinskys trademark off-rhythms and it harkens back to the operas and themes of Monteverdi, Gluck and Mozart.The Serialist, or Twelve Tone PeriodStravinsky first began to dabble in the twelve tone technique in smaller vocal work s such as the Cantata (1952), Three Songs from Shakespeare (1953) and In Memoriam Dylan Thomas (1954), as if he were testing the system. He later began