Old and New Directions in Stravinsky's Les Noces: Venturing Into

Old and New Directions in Stravinsky’s Les Noces: Venturing into Neoclassicism through the Avenues of Eurasianism, Exoticism, and Primitivism A thesis submitted to The Graduate School of the University of Cincinnati in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF MUSIC in Music History in the Division of Composition, Musicology, and Theory of the College–Conservatory of Music March 2020 By Maja Brlecic B.M., Northern Kentucky University, December 2013 Committee Chair: David C. Berry, Ph.D. Abstract Igor Stravinsky’s choral ballet Les Noces (1914–23), also referred to as Svádebka in Russian and The Wedding in English, depicts an arranged Russian peasant wedding in the nineteenth century. The four theatrical tableaux recall Russian folkloric heritage and Christian Orthodox religious elements that are coupled with exoticism and primitivism—two cultural themes that were key to keeping Sergei Diaghilev’s Ballet Russes afloat. I examine three intersecting relationships underlying Les Noces: Stravinsky’s use of the Russian folk and sacred traditions, his blending of Russian and Neoclassical elements, and his socio-political affiliations at the time. Accordingly, I interpret this svadebnaya igra (wedding game) from previously unexplored viewpoints and show how the work presents Stravinsky’s reinventions of formal structures. I demonstrate how this unusual work responds to what Russian musicologist Victor Belyayev calls “the call of the blood” in regard to Stravinsky’s departure from his homeland in 1914. In so doing, I argue that Les Noces, although often positioned as a culmination of his Russian period, also incorporates Neoclassical elements such as balance, simplicity, abstraction, and emotional restraint, all driven by distinct mechanical instrumentation. Additionally, although Stravinsky based the libretto on an anthology of Russian folklore and rituals, he claimed that the work is a product of the Russian church, and carefully constructed it for the modern French avant–garde culture. Such claims provide an opportunity to evaluate the sacred–secular sonic duality and how Stravinsky mixed them, for both are important driving forces behind the work. Relying on sources from both music and art history, as well as music theory and the history of Russia, I also examine the work through Stravinsky’s lesser-known involvement with Eurasianism—an ideology that illuminates the transition to his long and fruitful Neoclassical period. In doing so, I discuss the scope and range of Stravinsky’s experimentation with trends and music methods, and how all those elements were conceived, utilized, and understood. ii iii Table of Contents Introduction: Why Les Noces? 1 Background and Methodology 3 Literature Review 6 Summary of Chapters 8 Chapter 1: The Russian Folk and Sacred Traditions Amidst Primitive and Exotic Rituals in Early 1900s Paris 12 Slavic Folklore, Myths, and Otherness 13 Chant and Modality 18 Primitivism and Exoticism Intertwined 22 Chapter 2: Venturing into Neoclassicism 34 Les Noces and Neoclassicism—The Old World in the New 35 Objectivity vs. Subjectivity 41 Abstract but Real 44 Chapter 3: Eurasian/Turanian Phase 46 Where is Turan, and How Does It Relate to Stravinsky? 47 Turanian Music Idiom 51 Conclusion 56 Bibliography 60 iv List of Examples Example 1 16 Examples 2a–b 17 Example 3 20 Example 4 26 Examples 5a–c 52 v Introduction: Why Les Noces? Les Noces (1914–23) is a ballet that Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971) wrote for Sergei Diaghilev’s (1872–1929) Ballet Russes. The work calls for SATB chorus, soloists, four pianos, and percussion ensemble.1 Les Noces occupied Stravinsky for almost a decade while he lived in Switzerland and subsequently in France. Richard Taruskin claims that “no other work would ever be as important to him,”2 while Robert Craft portrays it as “something entirely new in both music—the heterophonic vocal-instrumental style of the piece—and in theatrical combination and genre, an amalgam of ballet and dramatic cantata that he himself [Stravinsky] was unable to describe.”3 Les Noces was undoubtedly important to the composer, but it has been studied less than his better known ballets such as The Firebird, Petrushka, and The Rite of Spring. Issues of style, interpretation, and reception surrounding the work invite closer examination. Scholars tend to classify Les Noces as a climax of Stravinsky’s Russian period. Given that, in the early 1920s, Stravinsky was already beginning to employ compositional elements that became markers of his Neoclassical works, whether the work belongs exclusively to the former period is debatable.4 As I will show, it contains the seeds of Neoclassical elements in both harmony and counterpoint, and it presents the reinvention of formal structure through a mixture of folkloristic, exotic, primitive, and sacred elements. Stravinsky achieves this by focusing on 1 Les Noces is the original title in French, also referred to as Svádebka in Russian and The Wedding in English. For the sake of consistency, I refer to the French title since it is the one that the composer used himself. However, when I quote other authors, I do not change it to the French title. 2 Richard Taruskin, “Stravinsky and the SuBhuman,” in Defining Russia Musically (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997), 390. 3 Quoted in Vera Stravinsky and RoBert Craft, Stravinsky in Pictures and Documents (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1978), 144. 4 Stravinsky’s oeuvre is roughly classified into three periods: Russian (1908–1923), Neoclassical (1923– 1953), and Serial (1953–1968). 1 three intersecting relationships: the use of Russian folk traditions, the blending of Russian and Neoclassical melodic elements, and engagement with the era’s political affiliations.5 For example, hidden in the composer’s idiosyncratic musical ideas are certain elements of Neoclassicism, such as austere instrumentation, endless melodic lines, multiple sudden apotheosis, and asymmetric rhythmic pulses, all of which drives this peasant wedding into a frenzy, with occasional heterophony.6 Because the work is an amalgam of primitive and modern idioms—and thus goes beyond its folkloric sources—this thesis will consider whether it portrays a universal ritual, or a specific wedding ceremony. This study will also supplement the discourse surrounding Les Noces by examining three things. First, how the work depicts Russian peasant life by turning to the primitive in order to appeal to the emerging modernist aesthetic of the time (i.e., avant-garde). Second, what compositional process and trends Stravinsky relied on. And third, whether the work connects to, or distances itself from, Stravinsky’s past. Because Stravinsky composed Les Noces during World War I and the 1917 Great October Socialist Revolution, the Russian folkloric themes in the work also represent what Victor Belyayev described as “the call of the blood”7—a provocative thought which in the 5 In this context, I use the term “primitivism” to evoke clearer conceptualization of Russian rituals in village weddings, where raw emotion, loud and uncontrolled soBBing, weeping, and even Beating oneself (usually, the bride) to the point of bruising, was a common part of the ritual. When applied to the early twentieth century arts, it could be a reaction to the complexities of Romanticism. As Jack Flam has asserted, “When we speak of primitivism, we refer not only to artists’ use of formal ideas from the works of co–called Primitive cultures, but also to a complex network of attitudes aBout the process, meaning, and functions of art, and about culture itself.” Jack Flam, and Miriam Deutch, Primitivism and Twentieth–Century Art: A Documentary History (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2003), xiii. 6 In his article, Tom Gordon states that “Stravinsky’s idiosyncratic views on language and the appropriate relationship Between text and music were Beginning to evolve at precisely the time he Began his Swiss exile.” Tom Gordon, “Stravinsky and C.F.Ramuz: A Primitive Classicism,” Canadian University Music Review, nr.4, (1983), 228. 7 Belyayev explains further that “Such a response is revealed in Les Noces. An answer to the ‘call of the blood,’ this work also shows itself to be an apotheosis of something, which, either by fate or, if you will, by the 2 second chapter I connect to Neoclassicism. To support a contextual reading of the work, I show how Stravinsky’s association with both Diaghilev’s World of Art group (Mir iskusstva) and the political Eurasianist movement (Yevraziystvo) of the day influenced the composer’s venture into exoticism and primitivism, and eventually into Neoclassicism. Finally, I invite the readers to perceive this work as Stravinsky’s own arduous transition from the East to the West. Background and Methodology In the 1910s, Stravinsky and Diaghilev transformed Russian Romantic ballet through their collaborations. Both newly arrived in Paris from Russia, the two distant cousins joined forces and began producing folkloristic works to be performed in the West—especially in France, where Diaghilev’s Ballet Russes was based. The ballet troupe consisted mainly of young first-class dancers brought from Russia, such as Tamara Karsavina, Vaslav Nijinsky, his sister Bronislava Nijinska, and Ana Pavlova. Stravinsky began composing and largely finished Les Noces during this decade, but the troupe did not premiere the work until 1923.8 Stravinsky and Diaghilev’s collaborations fit well into the early-twentieth century Parisian art scene, with its strong appetite for exotic musical varieties, as well as for works that revolutionized European art. Because I also argue that Les Noces represents Stravinsky’s own journey from East to West, what kind of Russia was he depicting for Parisian audiences? Was it the Russia he knew from his childhood, the real Russia after the 1917 Revolution, or a Russia that existed in his imagination? force of historical event, is destined to retire into the past and gradually to undergo dissolution, becoming non– existent.” Victor Belyayev, Igor Stravinsky’s Les Noces, trans.

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