Igor Stravinsky

Three Pieces for Clarinet

Russian-born Igor Stravinsky (1182-1971) is included among the Time 100, Time magazine's list of the most influential people of the 20th Century. Stravinsky shot to international fame with his early ballets, TheFirebird (1910), and Petrushka (1911), and his revolutionary The Rite of Spring (1913) ushered in Modernism and forever changed the way composers regarded rhythmic structures.

Stravinsky moved his family to Switzerland soon after The Firebird premiered in Paris and he developed an artistic partnership with Swiss philanthropist Werner Reinhart (1884-1951), who provided Stravinsky with financial backing for another revolutionary work, The Soldier's Tale (1918). Reinhart was himself an amateur clarinetist, and in gratitude Stravinsky composed for him the Three Pieces for Clarinet (1918, published 1919). The first movement, "always soft and very tranquil," is contemplative and exploits the instruments low register; the 2nd is written without barlines and is improvisatory in character; and the 3rd movement rather recalls the dance styles (i.e., Ragtime and Tango) used in The Soldier's Tale.

--Music @ Main, April 8, 2009 (UNF Clarinet Choir)

The Firebird Suite

STRAVINSKY...................The Firebird Suite (1919)

................................................Introduction—The Firebird and Its Dance—The Firebird's Variation

................................................The Princesses’ Khorovod (Round Dance)

................................................Infernal Dance of King Kashchei

................................................Berceuse (Lullaby)

................................................Finale

When Igor Stravinsky wakened on June 25, 1910, he was virtually unknown, but by the following morning he had become one of the most celebrated composers in Europe. His overnight success came with the premiere of The Firebird, the first original score commissioned by Serge Diaghilev for the Ballets Russes.

The dance company had dazzled Paris the previous year, but none of its first-season productions featured newly-composed music. For the second season, choreographer Michel Fokine and production designer Alexandre Benois devised an original scenario combining two characters from Slavic folklore. One is Zhar-ptitsa, the shimmering Firebird whose magic can bring either good fortune or bad. The other is the ogre-demon Kashchei the Deathless, whose back-story hobbies include kidnapping princesses and turning would-be rescuer knights into stone.

Since no fairytale is complete without a prince in tights, the story begins with the Introduction of Ivan Tsarevich lurking through the shadows. We can tell he is a good guy because he gave his entourage the night off, but the spooky music suggests that that might not have been a good idea. He spiesThe Firebird and Its Dance (with The Firebird's Variation). The Firebird flutters about erratically, but nonetheless is very beautiful, and shiny. Being a prince, Ivan knows that shiny is good, so he sneaks up and captures her. But being a hero, he lets her go when she begs for mercy. Before disappearing the Firebird gives Ivan a magic feather that can summon her if needed. Into the orchard tiptoe thirteen princesses bandying golden apples. Though obviously not condemned to hard labor, they are prisoners of Kashchei. Ivan joins them in The Princesses’ Khorovod, a circle-dance on the Russian folk song, In the Garden (introduced by solo oboe). The romantic reverie is interrupted by Kashchei and his minions, who capture Ivan. Before Kashchei can add Ivan to his collection of stone guests, the prince whips out the magic feather and the Firebird reappears. She casts a spell over the inhospitable horde, compelling them to dance the Infernal Dance of King Kashchei to exhaustion; she then lulls them to sleep with a Berceuse. While Kashchei snoozes, the Firebird reveals a giant egg that contains the demon's soul. Ivan smashes the egg, and Kashchei and his rotten corps vanish. As a fitting Finale, the gloomy realm becomes a sunny tableau, perfect for a wedding between Ivan and his dance partner from the previous evening. The formerly stone-faced knights join the princess bridesmaids, accompanied by triumphant reiterations of another Russian folk song, By the Gateway There Swayed the Tall Pine Tree.

The happy ending provided a very happy beginning for a young composer whose name is nearly synonymous with 20th-Century music. The Firebird’s success led to future collaborations with the Ballets Russes, including Petrushka (1911), the (almost literally) ground-breaking The Rite of Spring (1913), and Pulcinella (1920), which introduced Stravinsky's neoclassical style. But the course of music history nearly took another path. The unknown Stravinsky was not Diaghilev's first choice for The Firebird---he settled on Stravinsky only because his usual go-to guys proved unable to complete the commission.

Stravinsky incorporated many of the period's musical trends into The Firebird, with nods to Debussy, Ravel and Scriabin, and especially to Stravinsky’s teacher, Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov. Since Glinka's Ruslan and Ludmila (1842), Russian composers used exotic chromatic harmonies to depict supernatural characters, contrasting with folk-like diatonic tunes for mere mortals. For the former, Rimsky-Korsakov favored an octatonic scale alternating wholetones with semitones. Stravinsky uses the same octatonic scale, and the two folk songs he adapts were taken from a collection Rimsky-Korsakov had arranged. (Later in life Stravinsky reportedly would observe, "A good composer does not imitate; he steals.")

The Firebird is Stravinsky's most popular work, from which he arranged three concert suites, in 1911, 1919, and 1945; the 1919 version is the most-frequently performed. The composer complained he was invited too often to conduct music from his first ballet at the expense of his later works, but it must have held an enduring place in his heart. In his last orchestral piece, the brief Canon on a Russian Popular Tune (1965), Stravinsky returned to the folk song used at the end of The Firebird.