DOCSLIB.ORG

Aleksei Returns to London! the Official Launch of the London Firebird Orchestra

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Aleksei Returns to London! the Official Launch of the London Firebird Orchestra Aleksei Returns to London! The official launch of the London Firebird Orchestra Tuesday 12 June 2012, 7.30pm St Paul's Covent Garden, London (Pimm's available on the lawn, in the church's private garden, from 7pm) London Firebird Orchestra Patron: Dame Judi Dench CH DBE Chairman & Ar!s!c Director: Marc Corbe!Weaver Principal Conductor: Achim Holub Solo Cello: Aleksei Kiseliov Soprano: Julie!a Demetriades Beethoven Overture to the Creatures of the Prometheus, Op. 43 Elgar Cello Concerto in E minor, Op. 85 Wagner Vorspiel und Liebestod (from 'Tristan und Isolde') Stravinsky The Firebird Suite (1919) Tickets: £35, £25, £15 To book, please email: [email protected] www.FirebirdOrchestra.com "I am delighted to travel to London to support my friends Marc Corbe!-Weaver and Achim Holub in their exci"ng new orchestral venture and look forward to playing with many talented friends!" Aleksei Kiseliov Principal Cello of the Royal Sco"sh Na#onal Orchestra "Aleksei Kiseliov's performance was simply sublime. Clearly a great future awaits him." Dame Judi Dench Those were the words of Dame Judi Dench a"er hearing Aleksei perform in London in November 2007. Now, five years on, Aleksei is the principal cello of the Royal Sco#sh Na!onal Orchestra and has a world-renowned reputa!on as one of the most exci!ng cellists of his genera!on. Aleksei says "When I heard that my friends Marc Corbe$-Weaver and Achim Holub, - two musicians with whom I have collaborated many !mes over the years - had created a new orchestra, I was delighted to accept their invita!on to travel to London to be with them and support it. I wish them great success with the London Firebird Orchestra and I look forward to playing with many of my friends in June." The concert opens the Beethoven's vibrant Prometheus Overture. Then, Aleksei Kiseliov will sweep the audience away with his inspired interpreta!on of Elgar's heart-rending Cello Concerto. In the second half, the Firebird is joined by the award-winning soprano Julie$a Demetriades for Wagner's legendary masterpiece, Tristan und Isolde. Julie$a's recent successes in Berlin, Munich, Cairo, Helsinki, Prague, Poland, Greece and Cyprus have been hailed by the interna!onal press and by the UK's Musical Opinion. She is described as an ar!st who keeps ‘the audience hypno!sed with her charm and great ar!s!c skills.' She has appeared in countless roles across the stages of Europe and beyond; broadcast on numerous radio sta!ons, including Classic FM and Radio Israel, and won an array of awards, including at the Panhellenic Compe!!on in Athens, the Académie Ravel in France and the Beethoven, Chamber and Contemporary Music Prizes at the Royal Academy of Music. Having enjoyed early success with performances at St Paul's Covent Garden, the Queen Elizabeth Hall and St George's Hanover Square in Mayfair, the founders of the recently formed London Firebird Orchestra, Marc Corbe$-Weaver and Achim Holub, have been able to put together an exci!ng 2012/13 season, commencing in September 2012. Their forthcoming season includes performances across London - at Sadler's Wells, the Old Vic, Cadogan Hall, the Southbank, St George's Hanover Square and St Paul's Covent Garden - and in Bath, Stu$gart and various venues in Austria. To celebrate their early success, Firebird has chosen to conclude with a piece close to its name-sake, Stravinsky's magnificent Firebird Suite - a work of kaleidoscopic colour, furious energy and whimsical charm that symbolises the enlightened journey of the mythological bird, which, like the London Firebird Orchestra, aspires to rise into an exci!ng musical future! S E N N E D D W I E R L D LL A S T R G T E E E T E R T T S T E ' S T S S E R T R D E R O E R L H E U B T S N T R Y M S E A E L E K S T R R BO N E C W T L O E E A LT T A ST N E R RE E H E T H S T E E T S C E R L Y H T L J S E T A M S W U S E U O S R D C G S M T H N R W L N E A E E O T L O A R L L IN M I G T N L O R A N G L O ST F R E K E C C T TO R S VI TA O L S A A L S N B C S E A R N D S I F T O T O D E A R R R D N D A P S A L M T R A R C T E T E E S T S R E P P U WILLIAM IV STREET Prior to this landmark concert, Pimm's will be served on the lawn outside St Paul's Covent Garden, when the garden will be closed to St Paul’s Covent Garden the public. The audience is invited to arrive at 7pm to enjoy drinks Nearest Tube: Covent Garden, Leicester Square or and catch up with friends. Charing Cross.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Sir John Eliot Gardiner Conductor Stravinsky Symphony in Three Movements = 160 Andante—Interlude:Q L’Istesso Tempo— Con Moto Elgar in the South (Alassio), Op
    Program OnE HundrEd TwEnTIETH SEASOn Chicago Symphony orchestra riccardo muti Music director Pierre Boulez Helen regenstein Conductor Emeritus Yo-Yo ma Judson and Joyce Green Creative Consultant Global Sponsor of the CSO Thursday, January 20, 2011, at 8:00 Saturday, January 22, 2011, at 8:00 Sir John Eliot gardiner Conductor Stravinsky Symphony in Three Movements = 160 Andante—Interlude:q L’istesso tempo— Con moto Elgar In the South (Alassio), Op. 50 IntErmISSIon Bartók Concerto for Orchestra Introduzione: Andante non troppo—Allegro vivace Giuoco delle coppie: Allegro scherzando Elegia: Andante non troppo Intermezzo interrotto: Allegretto Finale: Presto Steinway is the official piano of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. This program is partially supported by grants from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts. CommEntS by PHILLIP HuSCHEr Igor Stravinsky Born June 18, 1882, Oranienbaum, Russia. Died April 6, 1971, New York City. Symphony in three movements o composer has given us more Stravinsky is again playing word Nperspectives on a “symphony” games. (And, perhaps, as has than Stravinsky. He wrote a sym- been suggested, he used the term phony at the very beginning of his partly to placate his publisher, who career (it’s his op. 1), but Stravinsky reminded him, after the score was quickly became famous as the finished, that he had been com- composer of three ballet scores missioned to write a symphony.) (Petrushka, The Firebird, and The Rite Then, at last, a true symphony: in of Spring), and he spent the next few 1938, Mrs. Robert Woods Bliss, years composing for the theater and together with Mrs.
    [Show full text]
  • Boston Symphony Orchestra Concert Programs, Season 93, 1973-1974
    BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA SEIJI OZAWA Music Director COLIN DAVIS & MICHAEL TILSON THOMAS Principal Guest Conductors NINETY-THIRD SEASON 1973-1974 THE TRUSTEES OF THE BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA INC. TALCOTT M. BANKS President PHILIP K. ALLEN SIDNEY STONEMAN JOHN L. THORNDIKE Vice-President Vice-President Treasurer VERNON R. ALDEN MRS HARRIS FAHNESTOCK JOHN T. NOONAN ALLEN G. BARRY HAROLD D. HODGKINSON MRS JAMES H. PERKINS MRS JOHN M. BRADLEY E. MORTON JENNINGS JR IRVING W. RABB RICHARD P. CHAPMAN EDWARD M. KENNEDY PAUL C. REARDON ABRAM T. COLLIER EDWARD G. MURRAY MRS GEORGE LEE SARGENT ARCHIE C. EPPS III JOHN HOYT STOOKEY TRUSTEES EMERITUS HENRY B. CABOT HENRY A. LAUGHLIN PALFREY PERKINS FRANCIS W. HATCH EDWARD A. TAFT ADMINISTRATION OF THE BOSTON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA THOMAS D. PERRY JR THOMAS W. MORRIS Executive Director Manager PAUL BRONSTEIN JOHN H. CURTIS MARY H. SMITH Business Manager Public Relations Director Assistant to the Manager FORRESTER C. SMITH DANIEL R. GUSTIN RICHARD C. WHITE Development Director Administrator of Assistant to Educational Affairs the Manager DONALD W. MACKENZIE JAMES F. KILEY Operations Manager, Operations Manager, Symphony Hall Tanglewood HARRY NEVILLE Program Editor Copyright © 1974 by Boston Symphony Orchestra Inc. SYMPHONY HALL BOSTON MASSACHUSETTS tt wVid SPRING LINES Outline your approach to spring. In greater detail with our hand- somely tailored, single breasted, navy wool worsted coat. Subtly smart with yoked de- tail at front and back. Elegantly fluid with back panel. A refined spring line worth wearing. $150. Coats. Boston Chestnut Hill Northshore Shopping Center South Shore Plazagurlingt '1 .WTwi CONTENTS Program for April 16 1974 Program notes Haydn - Symphony No.
    [Show full text]
  • Nietzsche, Debussy, and the Shadow of Wagner
    NIETZSCHE, DEBUSSY, AND THE SHADOW OF WAGNER A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Cornell University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Tekla B. Babyak May 2014 ©2014 Tekla B. Babyak ii ABSTRACT NIETZSCHE, DEBUSSY, AND THE SHADOW OF WAGNER Tekla B. Babyak, Ph.D. Cornell University 2014 Debussy was an ardent nationalist who sought to purge all German (especially Wagnerian) stylistic features from his music. He claimed that he wanted his music to express his French identity. Much of his music, however, is saturated with markers of exoticism. My dissertation explores the relationship between his interest in musical exoticism and his anti-Wagnerian nationalism. I argue that he used exotic markers as a nationalistic reaction against Wagner. He perceived these markers as symbols of French identity. By the time that he started writing exotic music, in the 1890’s, exoticism was a deeply entrenched tradition in French musical culture. Many 19th-century French composers, including Felicien David, Bizet, Massenet, and Saint-Saëns, founded this tradition of musical exoticism and established a lexicon of exotic markers, such as modality, static harmonies, descending chromatic lines and pentatonicism. Through incorporating these markers into his musical style, Debussy gives his music a French nationalistic stamp. I argue that the German philosopher Nietzsche shaped Debussy’s nationalistic attitude toward musical exoticism. In 1888, Nietzsche asserted that Bizet’s musical exoticism was an effective antidote to Wagner. Nietzsche wrote that music should be “Mediterranized,” a dictum that became extremely famous in fin-de-siècle France.
    [Show full text]
  • 4. Wagner Prelude to Tristan Und Isolde (For Unit 6: Developing Musical Understanding)
    4. Wagner Prelude to Tristan und Isolde (For Unit 6: Developing Musical Understanding) Background information and performance circumstances Richard Wagner (1813-1883) was the greatest exponent of mid-nineteenth-century German romanticism. Like some other leading nineteenth-century musicians, but unlike those from previous eras, he was never a professional instrumentalist or singer, but worked as a freelance composer and conductor. A genius of over-riding force and ambition, he created a new genre of ‘music drama’ and greatly expanded the expressive possibilities of tonal composition. His works divided musical opinion, and strongly influenced several generations of composers across Europe. Career Brought up in a family with wide and somewhat Bohemian artistic connections, Wagner was discouraged by his mother from studying music, and at first was drawn more to literature – a source of inspiration he shared with many other romantic composers. It was only at the age of 15 that he began a secret study of harmony, working from a German translation of Logier’s School of Thoroughbass. [A reprint of this book is available on the Internet - http://archive.org/details/logierscomprehen00logi. The approach to basic harmony, remarkably, is very much the same as we use today.] Eventually he took private composition lessons, completing four years of study in 1832. Meanwhile his impatience with formal training and his obsessive attention to what interested him led to a succession of disasters over his education in Leipzig, successively at St Nicholas’ School, St Thomas’ School (where Bach had been cantor), and the university. At the age of 15, Wagner had written a full-length tragedy, and in 1832 he wrote the libretto to his first opera.
    [Show full text]
  • Florida State University Libraries
    Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2009 Gustav Mahler, Alfred Roller, and the Wagnerian Gesamtkunstwerk: Tristan and Affinities Between the Arts at the Vienna Court Opera Stephen Carlton Thursby Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF MUSIC GUSTAV MAHLER, ALFRED ROLLER, AND THE WAGNERIAN GESAMTKUNSTWERK: TRISTAN AND AFFINITIES BETWEEN THE ARTS AT THE VIENNA COURT OPERA By STEPHEN CARLTON THURSBY A Dissertation submitted to the College of Music in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Degree Awarded: Spring Semester, 2009 The members of the Committee approve the Dissertation of Stephen Carlton Thursby defended on April 3, 2009. _______________________________ Denise Von Glahn Professor Directing Dissertation _______________________________ Lauren Weingarden Outside Committee Member _______________________________ Douglass Seaton Committee Member Approved: ___________________________________ Douglass Seaton, Chair, Musicology ___________________________________ Don Gibson, Dean, College of Music The Graduate School has verified and approved the above named committee members. ii To my wonderful wife Joanna, for whose patience and love I am eternally grateful. In memory of my grandfather, James C. Thursby (1926-2008). iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The completion of this dissertation would not have been possible without the generous assistance and support of numerous people. My thanks go to the staff of the Austrian Theater Museum and Austrian National Library-Music Division, especially to Dr. Vana Greisenegger, curator of the visual materials in the Alfred Roller Archive of the Austrian Theater Museum. I would also like to thank the musicology faculty of the Florida State University College of Music for awarding me the Curtis Mayes Scholar Award, which funded my dissertation research in Vienna over two consecutive summers (2007- 2008).
    [Show full text]
  • Baroque 1590-1750 Classical 1750-1820
    Period Year Opera Composer Notes A pastoral drama featuring a Dafne new style of sung dialogue, 1597 Jacopo Peri more expressive than speech but less melodious than song The first opera to survive 1600 Euridice Jacopo Peri in tact The earliest opera still 1607 Orfeo Claudio Monteverdi performed today Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria Claudio Monteverdi 1639 (The Return of Ulysses) L’incoronazione di Poppea 1643 (The Coronation of Poppea) Claudio Monteverdi 1647 Ofeo Luigi Rossi 1649 Giasone Francesco Cavalli 1651 La Calisto Francesco Cavalli 1674 Alceste Jean-Baptiste Lully 1676 Atys Jean-Baptiste Lully Venus and Adonis John Blow Considered the first English 1683 opera 1686 Armide Jean-Baptiste Lully 1689 Dido and Aeneas Henry Purcell Baroque 1590-1750 1700 L’Eraclea Alessandro Scarlatti 1710 Agrippina George Frederick Handel 1711 Rinaldo George Frederick Handel 1721 Griselda Alesandro Scarlatti 1724 Giulio Cesere George Frederick Handel 1728 The Beggar’s Opera John Gay 1731 Acis and Galatea George Frederick Handel La serva padrona 1733 (The Servant Turned Giovanni Battista Pergolesi Mistress) 1737 Castor and Pollux Jean-Philippe Rameau 1744 Semele George Frederick Handel 1745 Platee Jean-Philippe Rameau La buona figliuola 1760 (The Good-natured Girl) Niccolò Piccinni 1762 Orfeo ed Euridice Christoph Willibald Gluck 1768 Bastien und Bastienne Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Mozart’s first opera Il mondo della luna 1777 (The World on the Moon) Joseph Haydn 1779 Iphigénie en Tauride Christoph Willibald Gluck 1781 Idomeneo Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Mozart’s
    [Show full text]
  • A Comparison of Rhythm, Articulation, and Harmony in Jean-Michel Defaye's À La Manière De Stravinsky Pour Trombone Et Piano
    A COMPARISON OF RHYTHM, ARTICULATION, AND HARMONY IN JEAN- MICHEL DEFAYE’S À LA MANIÈRE DE STRAVINSKY POUR TROMBONE ET PIANO TO COM MON COMPOSITIONAL STRATEGIES OF IGOR STRAVINSKY Dustin Kyle Mullins, B.M., M.M. Dissertation Prepared for the Degree of DOCTOR OF MUSICAL ARTS UNIVERSITY OF NORTH TEXAS August 2014 APPROVED: Tony Baker, Major Professor Eugene Corporon, Minor Professor John Holt, Committee Member and Chair of the Division of Instrumental Studies James Scott, Dean of the College of Music Mark Wardell, Dean of the Toulouse Graduate School Mullins, Dustin Kyle. A Comparison of Rhythm, Articulation, and Harmony in Jean-Michel Defaye’s À la Manière de Stravinsky pour Trombone et Piano to Common Compositional Strategies of Igor Stravinsky. Doctor of Musical Arts (Performance), August 2014, 45 pp., 2 tables, 27 examples, references, 28 titles. À la Manière de Stravinsky is one piece in a series of works composed by Jean- Michel Defaye that written emulating the compositional styles of significant composers of the past. This dissertation compares Defaye’s work to common compositional practices of Igor Stravinsky (1882 – 1971). There is currently limited study of Defaye’s set of À la Manière pieces and their imitative characteristics. The first section of this dissertation presents the significance of the project, current literature, and methods of examination. The next section provides critical information on Jean-Michel Defaye and Igor Stravinsky. The following three chapters contain a compositional comparison of À la Manière de Stravinsky to Stravinsky’s use of rhythm, articulation, and harmony. The final section draws a conclusion of the piece’s significance in the solo trombone repertoire.
    [Show full text]
  • The Strategic Half-Diminished Seventh Chord and the Emblematic Tristan Chord: a Survey from Beethoven to Berg
    International Journal ofMusicology 4 . 1995 139 Mark DeVoto (Medford, Massachusetts) The Strategic Half-diminished Seventh Chord and The Emblematic Tristan Chord: A Survey from Beethoven to Berg Zusammenfassung: Der strategische halbverminderte Septakkord und der em­ blematische Tristan-Akkord von Beethoven bis Berg im Oberblick. Der halb­ verminderte Septakkord tauchte im 19. Jahrhundert als bedeutende eigen­ standige Hannonie und als Angelpunkt bei der chromatischen Modulation auf, bekam aber eine besondere symbolische Bedeutung durch seine Verwendung als Motiv in Wagners Tristan und Isolde. Seit der Premiere der Oper im Jahre 1865 lafit sich fast 100 Jahre lang die besondere Entfaltung des sogenannten Tristan-Akkords in dramatischen Werken veifolgen, die ihn als Emblem fUr Liebe und Tod verwenden. In Alban Bergs Lyrischer Suite und Lulu erreicht der Tristan-Akkord vielleicht seine hOchste emblematische Ausdruckskraft nach Wagner. If Wagner's Tristan und Isolde in general, and its Prelude in particular, have stood for more than a century as the defining work that liberated tonal chro­ maticism from its diatonic foundations of the century before it, then there is a particular focus within the entire chromatic conception that is so well known that it even has a name: the Tristan chord. This is the chord that occurs on the downbeat of the second measure of the opera. Considered enharmonically, tills chord is of course a familiar structure, described in many textbooks as a half­ diminished seventh chord. It is so called because it can be partitioned into a diminished triad and a minor triad; our example shows it in comparison with a minor seventh chord and an ordinary diminished seventh chord.
    [Show full text]
  • The Firebird
    EDUCATION Education RESOURCE THE WITH PAQUITA SUPPORTED BY NATIONAL TOURING SUPPORTING EDUCATION CHOREOGRAPHER VAL CANIPAROLI PARTNER rnzb.org.nz facebook.com/nzballet CONTENTS Curriculum links 3 The Firebird 4 The characters 4 The story 5 The creatives 7 Q&A with Loughlan Prior 12 The history of The Firebird 14 Dance activities 16 Crafts and puzzles 18 What to do at a ballet 22 Ballet timeline 23 THE FIREBIRD 29 JULY – 2 SEPTEMBER 2021 2 CURRICULUM LINKS In this unit you and your students will: WORKSHOP LEARNING • Learn about the elements that come OBJECTIVES FOR together to create a theatrical ballet LEVELS 3 & 4 experience. Level 3 students will learn how to: • Identify the processes involved in Develop practical knowledge making a theatre production. • Use the dance elements to develop and share their personal movement vocabulary. CURRICULUM LINKS IN Develop ideas THIS UNIT • Select and combine dance elements in response to a variety of stimuli. Values Communicate and interpret Students will be encouraged to value: • Prepare and share dance movement • Innovation, inquiry and curiosity, individually and in pairs or groups. by thinking critically, creatively and • Use the elements of dance to describe dance reflectively. movements and respond to dances from a • Diversity, as found in our different cultures variety of cultures. and heritages. • Community and participation for the Level 4 students will learn how to: common good. Develop practical knowledge • Apply the dance elements to extend personal KEY COMPETENCIES movement skills and vocabularies and to explore the vocabularies of others. • Using language, symbols and text – Develop ideas Students will recognise how choices of • Combine and contrast the dance elements to language and symbols in live theatre affect express images, ideas, and feelings in dance, people’s understanding and the ways in using a variety of choreographic processes.
    [Show full text]
  • NATALIA-GONCHAROVA EN.Pdf
    INDEX Press release Fact Sheet Photo Sheet Exhibition Walkthrough A CLOSER LOOK Goncharova and Italy: Controversy, Inspiration, Friendship by Ludovica Sebregondi ‘A spritual autobiography’: Goncharova’s exhibition of 1913 by Evgenia Iliukhina Activities in the exhibition and beyond List of the works Natalia Goncharova A woman of the avant-garde with Gauguin, Matisse and Picasso Florence, Palazzo Strozzi, 28.09.2019–12.01.2020 #NataliaGoncharova This autumn Palazzo Strozzi will present a major retrospective of the leading woman artist of the twentieth- century avant-garde, Natalia Goncharova. Natalia Goncharova will offer visitors a unique opportunity to encounter Natalia Goncharova’s multi-faceted artistic output. A pioneering and radical figure, Goncharova’s work will be presented alongside masterpieces by the celebrated artists who served her either as inspiration or as direct interlocutors, such as Paul Gauguin, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Giacomo Balla and Umberto Boccioni. Natalia Goncharova who was born in the province of Tula in 1881, died in Paris in 1962 was the first women artist of the Russian avant-garde to reach fame internationally. She exhibited in the most important European avant-garde exhibitions of the era, including the Blaue Reiter Munich, the Deutsche Erste Herbstsalon at the Galerie Der Sturm in Berlin and at the post-impressionist exhibition in London. At the forefront of the avant- garde, Goncharova scandalised audiences at home in Moscow when she paraded, in the most elegant area of the city with her face and body painted. Defying public morality, she was also the first woman to exhibit paintings depicting female nudes in Russia, for which she was accused and tried in Russian courts.
    [Show full text]
  • Cambridge Opera Handbooks Richard Wagner Tristan Und Isolde
    Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-43738-7 — Richard Wagner: Tristan und Isolde Edited by Arthur Groos Frontmatter More Information Cambridge Opera Handbooks Richard Wagner Tristan und Isolde Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde occupies a singular position in the history of Western culture. What Nietzsche called the ‘terrible and sweet infinity’ of its basic nexus of longing and death has fascinated audiences since its first performance in 1865. At the same time, its advanced harmonic language, immediately announced by the opening ‘Tristan chord’, marks a defining moment in the evolution of modern music. This accessible handbook brings together seven leading international writers to discuss the opera’s genesis and the libretto’s relationship to late Romantic literary concerns, to present an analysis of the Prelude, the music of the drama itself, and Wagner’s innova- tive use of instrumental timbre, and to illustrate the production history and reception of the music-drama into the twenty-first century. The book includes the first English translation of Wagner’s prose draft of the libretto, a detailed discussion of Wagner’s orchestration, and rare pictures from important and influential productions. Arthur Groos is Avalon Foundation Professor in the Humanities at Cornell University, where he has taught since 1973. A member of the departments of German Studies, Medieval Studies, and Music, his musical interests focus on issues of music and culture, and opera, especially Wagner, Puccini, and modern opera. His books include Giacomo Puccini: La bohème (with Roger Parker, 1986) and Romancing the Grail: Genre, Science, and Quest in Wolfram’s Parzival (1995), as well as the collections Reading Opera (1988), Madama Butterfly: Fonti e documenti (2005), and seven other edited volumes.
    [Show full text]
  • Stravinsky and the Octatonic: a Reconsideration
    Stravinsky and the Octatonic: A Reconsideration Dmitri Tymoczko Recent and not-so-recent studies by Richard Taruskin, Pieter lary, nor that he made explicit, conscious use of the scale in many van den Toorn, and Arthur Berger have called attention to the im- of his compositions. I will, however, argue that the octatonic scale portance of the octatonic scale in Stravinsky’s music.1 What began is less central to Stravinsky’s work than it has been made out to as a trickle has become a torrent, as claims made for the scale be. In particular, I will suggest that many instances of purported have grown more and more sweeping: Berger’s initial 1963 article octatonicism actually result from two other compositional tech- described a few salient octatonic passages in Stravinsky’s music; niques: modal use of non-diatonic minor scales, and superimposi- van den Toorn’s massive 1983 tome attempted to account for a tion of elements belonging to different scales. In Part I, I show vast swath of the composer’s work in terms of the octatonic and that the rst of these techniques links Stravinsky directly to the diatonic scales; while Taruskin’s even more massive two-volume language of French Impressionism: the young Stravinsky, like 1996 opus echoed van den Toorn’s conclusions amid an astonish- Debussy and Ravel, made frequent use of a variety of collections, ing wealth of musicological detail. These efforts aim at nothing including whole-tone, octatonic, and the melodic and harmonic less than a total reevaluation of our image of Stravinsky: the com- minor scales.
    [Show full text]