Who actually listens to Stravinsky?

[Monsieur Croche]

Claims which could be put to rest if one were to simply read what Stravinsky said and wrote during the last two decades of his life (1951 was when The Rakes Progress debuted, and was his last non-serial composition.  One could argue that as early as 1947 he had begun a stylistic shift in his private studies).  From 1954-1968 was one of his most prolific periods, when he wrote a group of large works, all using essentially the same serial-ish style. 

His was a deliberate and serious change in his process which was entirely his own, as were the works.

There is also the evidence of one's ears if you are familiar with much of the rest of Stravinsky.  The serial works sound "too much like Stravinsky" to have been composed by anyone else: they have his musical fingerprints and DNA all over them, the motor habits, the choice of intervals, the harmonies, all. 
(I make one exception from that later body of work, his Variations for Piano and Orchestra sounds like a really fine composer wanting to get one up on ole Anton, i.e. out-Webern Webern :-)

If you've got ears, used them in having listened to a fair amount of Stravinsky up through the neoclassical period, there is no doubt as to who wrote his serial works.   

[Abuelo Igor]

my lack of apprecaition for the Rake only increased after seeing the opera live (conducted by the late Christopher Hogwood, no less). I've almost given up on these pieces, I must confess...

What ugliness! 

I wonder, have you ever disagreed with Boulez or was he simply right all the time?

[calyptorhynchus]

I don't, any music of his I have heard just sounds awful. I don't even think the Rite of Spring is very good.

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

I don't, any music of his I have heard just sounds awful. I don't even think the Rite of Spring is very good.

This is all very well that his music may sound awful to your ears. What works have you heard that have influenced you to arrive at this opinion?

[Cato]

There is also the evidence of one's ears if you are familiar with much of the rest of Stravinsky.  The serial works sound "too much like Stravinsky" to have been composed by anyone else: they have his musical fingerprints and DNA all over them, the motor habits, the choice of intervals, the harmonies, all.

If you've got ears, used them in having listened to a fair amount of Stravinsky up through the neoclassical period, there is no doubt as to who wrote his serial works.

Plus, there is the matter of the man's pride and character: Would STRAVINSKY really let somebody else compose - or even help him compose - anything and then put his own name, STRAVINSKY, on it?

From what I have read of and by Stravinsky throughout the decades, I would say no.

[Ghost Sonata]

I don't so much as listen to Stravinsky, really; rather, his music informs my entire being. 

[Dancing Divertimentian]

A great many scores by Игорь Фëдорович won me over immediately.

Ditto

But the Concerto in D is a piece (another is The Rake's Progress) which I appreciated only later.

Ditto again, mainly for Rake, although at this point I can't say for certain whether I'll ever be completely won over by the work. It's sublime in places but the gaps separating the sublime bits can seem interminable, although, admittedly, waiting out the gaps is always worth it!

But what I wouldn't give for the sublime bits to be strung closer together...

[ritter]

I wonder, have you ever disagreed with Boulez...?

Very seldom, but there's been the odd occasion... 

But really, whatever Boulez might have said about the Rake or the Concerto in D was nowhere near my mind when I wrote my comment or when I saw the Rake live (actually, I don't reacll having read anything specific by Boulez on these pieces). And, as you can see in this thread, I'm not alone as far as my opinion on these two pieces is concerned. There are several neoclassical Stravinsky pieces I enjoy a lot (Dumbarton Oaks, the Danses concertantes, Pulcinella, the Violin concerto...), but the "tail end" of his neo-classical period leaves me cold. ¡Qué se le va a hacer! Good for you if you like them...

Your "what ugliness" remark baffles me...

Regards,

[Jo498]

I don't, any music of his I have heard just sounds awful. I don't even think the Rite of Spring is very good.

Stravinsky's music is highly diverse; it encompasses rather different sound worlds. Already the three famous balletts are all different from each other. Firebird close to Rimsky and Debussy, Petrushka a collage of all kinds of stuff, Le Sacre establishing the "barbaric" style. But then the Soldier's tale is a completely different soundworld, the Symphony of Psalms another one. Than we have the lucid neobaroque of e.g "Dumbarton Oaks" and so on.
True, some pieces, above all the three early balletts are far better known than others. But the whole oeuvre is so diverse that one cannot really tell much from sampling e.g. only those balletts.

[DaveF]

Well, whenever they get the recently re-discovered work of his corrected and published, then performed, things should definitely be given a shot in the ol' arm.

You mean the Funeral Song in memory of Rimsky-Korsakov?  It's over a year now since it was discovered, and no sign of a performance/recording.  It's supposed to be 12 minutes long, so I can't imagine that reconstructing the lost score from the parts is too big a job.  Lack of money/will/interest, perhaps?

With late Stravinsky, surely some of the problem regarding (non-)performance is caused by the, shall we say, imaginative instrumental requirements.  In Memoriam Dylan Thomas: voice, string quartet and four trombones; Elegy for JFK: voice and 3 clarinets; Three Shakespeare Songs: voice, flute, clarinet, viola; the Cantata (perhaps my all-time favourite Stravinsky piece): 2 vocal soloists, female chorus, 2 flutes, 2 oboes and cello.  Sadly, very sadly, they're just awkward to fit into concert programmes.

[Abuelo Igor]

Your "what ugliness" remark baffles me...

It is supposed to be Pierre's remark on the Rake première, as reported on a letter to John Cage. It is out there on Google somewhere...

Of course I am not entirely serious when I imply that you shape your opinons around whatever Boulez might have said on a particular musical subject, but, in my experience, whenever you don't like something French, for example, it can usually be traced to a statement by the man. I recall being surprised when an avowed Francophile like you expressed an open disdain for Poulenc's music. I did a little research to see if Pierre ever said anything about that composer, and there it was. Same for Turangalila, which, if you only read this forum, would turn out to be the worst thing that Messiaen ever wrote. 

As for not being alone in one's opinion, well, I suppose that several people can be wrong together, including myself.

Sorry if I'm a little touchy on this subject, but, back in the days when I actually had personal contact with classical music lovers, I had to swallow a lot of contempt for Stravinsky from trendy "I only like the contemporary stuff" types who said that Igor had completely sold out from the 1920s onwards and that works like the Violin Concerto were worth nothing. I suppose that the neoclassical period kind of threatened the post-Darmstadt world view, which is ironic considering the little attention Stravinsky's final works get from the same set of people.

As for The Rake, the first act can be a little tough going, but after that I think it's fun. I attended that same performance and I have good memories of it, and not only because I took a girl to the dress rehearsal and she liked it...

[arpeggio]

I have limited experiences as an amateur.

The Stravinsky work I have performed the most is the Symphony of Psalms.  It is very popular among community choirs.

[Karl Henning]

I have limited experiences as an amateur.

The Stravinsky work I have performed the most is the Symphony of Psalms.  It is very popular among community choirs.

Deservedly so! A magnificent piece, marvelous scoring, and choral writing which is expert, gratifying, and gorgeous.

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

[arpeggio]

I love the ending when the contra plays that low pedal C.

[ComposerOfAvantGarde]

I quite like this moment in the third movement:

https://www.youtube.com/v/pbX3XXJrG-4

[Karl Henning]

I love the ending when the contra plays that low pedal C.

There are, to my ears, five dozen Perfect Moments like that in Stravinsky, absolutely musical magic.

[aleazk]

Lately, I love these two (from his late, serial period):

-Epitaphium:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uecxpgM44k4

-Abraham and Issac for Baritone and Orchestra:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wawoCDQDKMI

[ritter]

I I recall being surprised when an avowed Francophile like you expressed an open disdain for Poulenc's music.

Mmmm...you're talking to the man who opened a thread on Reynaldo Hahn...

Thanks for your detailed response, but let's not derail this Stravinsky thread into yet another Boulez discussion. I might reply to you in detail in a more appropriate thread (particularlly, as some books I've read recently include some gratuitous Boulez-bashing that I'd like to address).

As for the Rake, those perfomances you and I attended made my dislike (perhaps that's too strong a word) increase, as I've already said. And I partially blame Robert Lepage for this, as the circus aesthetics of his staging is particularly alien to me. In any case, I do not find the Rake ugly (I think none of good old Igor Fyodorich's music is ugly at all), but simply bland and boring. And yet, as Dancing Divertimentian points out, there are some very inspired moments (for instance, Anne's lullaby towards the end), but not enough to justify a full-length opera. And I've come to this position after many years of living with Stravinsky's oeuvre, including times when I had a much higher opinion of the Rake.

This might be seen as a cliché, but I think that at that point in time (late 40s) Stravinsky had exhausted what he had to say in that style, had reached a point of stagantion, and could only escape from it by embracing serialism (fortunately for us, as we can now enjoy all the wonderful late works).

Regards,

[San Antone]

I don't know if it has been mentioned (probably is known to most here, but anyway) regarding Stravinsky's last period, this book is an indispensable guide for the serious listener:

[asin]0521602882[/asin]

[Karl Henning]

I don't know if it has been mentioned (probably is known to most here, but anyway) regarding Stravinsky's last period, this book is an indispensable guide for the serious listener:

[asin]0521602882[/asin]

Very nice!

More recently, of course, serialism's star, never very high, has fallen into almost total eclipse, and Stravinsky's late music has suffered the same neglect as other serial works from the 1950s and 1960s.  As a result, to paraphrase Millton Babbitt's quip about Schoenberg, Stravinsky's late music was never in fashion, and now it is neglected as old-fashioned.