Igor Stravinsky
Le Sacre du Printemps
London Philharmonic Orchestra
Bernard Haitink - conducting.
This is a very enjoyable performance of the Rite and is paired with an even better recording of Petrushka.
July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
Igor Stravinsky
Le Sacre du Printemps
London Philharmonic Orchestra
Bernard Haitink - conducting.
This is a very enjoyable performance of the Rite and is paired with an even better recording of Petrushka.
"To appreciate the greatness of the Masters is to keep faith in the greatness of humanity." - Wilhelm Furtwängler
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
If you want a change from the orchestra ..
By the way the "concerto" mentioned is for just two pianos [no orchestra].
By the way the "concerto" mentioned is for just two pianos [no orchestra].
"Change is Possible" [Parking Meter in Dundrum Shopping Centre]
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
As we now have no project for the month of September I personally want to revisit this particular project as, once again, I have been surprised at myself with my own personal result at the end of it. This was a tough project for me personally but I did enjoy the odyssey so I hope to put my thoughts in order and force them upon you all soon.
To be is to do: Socrates
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
Hoping I'm not intruding by commenting on this earlier 'project', but following on from Fergus, just to say that the score is a good idea as the sections, joining into each other, are described above the music. But failing that, it's possible that your recording may offer an MP3 download on Amazon from which you might derive the timings of each section? Even with other performances the timings might be approximate enough. The Boulez recording has MP3 timings, also the Rattle with the National Youth Orchestra does.Diapason wrote:I think that's a good way to look at it but I can't even figure out where the 'joins' are. To the score with me, I think.
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
If you prefer that this topic isn't continued right now, please delete this post. Ta!
It‘s a work that has long fascinated me. By any measure a brilliant composition and though highly dissonant is fairly modal at times. It posed a few performance problems that surely gave Monteux a few headaches. The 4-hand piano reduction was used for rehearsals.
Of Stravinsky's Diaghilev ballets Le Sacre seems to make the more exciting concert piece. Stravinsky made revisions in 1947 that some observers feel were to establish it as a concert work. He knew it was his big hit but no doubt wondered if it would be staged as a ballet again. I believe he simplified the way he notated the rhythms slightly. Anything to make it easier (and keep hold of the copyright)!
As for recordings, I’ve found some more passionate than accurate and vice versa. I favoured Mehta with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. It’s surging passion brings out vitality and drive but takes a couple of liberties here and there. Boulez whom I also heard at the time, seemed accurate but less "possessing". Doesn’t matter which. These things are personal taste in the end.
Later I happened upon Dorati with the Minneapolis, another driving, raw performance recorded in the Living Presence series. Hard to believe it was recorded in 1957, it‘s almost too hi-fi to be true.
I’ve stayed with these two and probably should find something more recent although I don‘t listen to them too often nowadays.
...
It’s a work that stands almost alone, allegedly giving Boulez and Webern the inspiration for total serialism. They acknowledged Schoenberg but were unhappy that he hadn’t tackled rhythm in the way he had, pitch.
Certainly a work that made people sit up in 1913 and still does.
It‘s a work that has long fascinated me. By any measure a brilliant composition and though highly dissonant is fairly modal at times. It posed a few performance problems that surely gave Monteux a few headaches. The 4-hand piano reduction was used for rehearsals.
Of Stravinsky's Diaghilev ballets Le Sacre seems to make the more exciting concert piece. Stravinsky made revisions in 1947 that some observers feel were to establish it as a concert work. He knew it was his big hit but no doubt wondered if it would be staged as a ballet again. I believe he simplified the way he notated the rhythms slightly. Anything to make it easier (and keep hold of the copyright)!
As for recordings, I’ve found some more passionate than accurate and vice versa. I favoured Mehta with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. It’s surging passion brings out vitality and drive but takes a couple of liberties here and there. Boulez whom I also heard at the time, seemed accurate but less "possessing". Doesn’t matter which. These things are personal taste in the end.
Later I happened upon Dorati with the Minneapolis, another driving, raw performance recorded in the Living Presence series. Hard to believe it was recorded in 1957, it‘s almost too hi-fi to be true.
I’ve stayed with these two and probably should find something more recent although I don‘t listen to them too often nowadays.
...It’s a work that stands almost alone, allegedly giving Boulez and Webern the inspiration for total serialism. They acknowledged Schoenberg but were unhappy that he hadn’t tackled rhythm in the way he had, pitch.
Certainly a work that made people sit up in 1913 and still does.
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
Dane wrote:If you prefer that this topic isn't continued right now, please delete this post. Ta!
On the contrary please feel very free to share your thoughts not only on this project but any other one that might take your fancy. Your input and thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
To be is to do: Socrates
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
Some time has passed since the discussions on this thread but here, belatedly, are my thoughts on and interpretation of Part 1:
I really like the introduction, the awaking of spring. The forced sound of the bassoon playing at the very highest registers is, I find, quite evocative of young shoots or buds pushing or forcing their way into existence. The strong dissonances also evoke for me the battle between dormant life and life struggling to resurrect itself.
I like the sudden way that both the tone and the mood change with the Augurs of Spring. The constant rhythmic patterns bring a great sense of both tension and excitement and this is brought to another level in the next section, Ritual of Abduction which is obviously designed to portray the inherent violence of the young men carrying off the women.
I find the next section, Spring Rounds, quite lyrical even with its inherent dissonances and discords played over a slow but well defined if somewhat menacing rhythm. Approximately half way through this section although the same musical motifs are played and the same rhythmic patterns are retained the pitch of the orchestra rises to a crescendo resulting in a hostile and menacing atmosphere. Everything becomes accentuated and the sense of menace is gripping culminating in an excited dance sequence towards the end of the section. We finish this section with our original sense of the idyllic. I find this a very effective section musically in how it induces the various changes in mood and atmosphere.
The Ritual of the Rival Tribes introduces a bellicose element into the proceedings very well achieved by the timpani. One can easily visualise the various protagonists strutting their stuff around the stage! The instrumentation used in the Procession of the Sage is very effective in evoking his stature in terms of describing his solemn and almost sacred input into the proceedings. One can sense the power of his being and his great sense of presence. Everything comes to a shuddering halt in the Adoration of the Earth until the frenzy is unleashed once again in the Dance of the Earth in a way that I find very exciting.
I really like the introduction, the awaking of spring. The forced sound of the bassoon playing at the very highest registers is, I find, quite evocative of young shoots or buds pushing or forcing their way into existence. The strong dissonances also evoke for me the battle between dormant life and life struggling to resurrect itself.
I like the sudden way that both the tone and the mood change with the Augurs of Spring. The constant rhythmic patterns bring a great sense of both tension and excitement and this is brought to another level in the next section, Ritual of Abduction which is obviously designed to portray the inherent violence of the young men carrying off the women.
I find the next section, Spring Rounds, quite lyrical even with its inherent dissonances and discords played over a slow but well defined if somewhat menacing rhythm. Approximately half way through this section although the same musical motifs are played and the same rhythmic patterns are retained the pitch of the orchestra rises to a crescendo resulting in a hostile and menacing atmosphere. Everything becomes accentuated and the sense of menace is gripping culminating in an excited dance sequence towards the end of the section. We finish this section with our original sense of the idyllic. I find this a very effective section musically in how it induces the various changes in mood and atmosphere.
The Ritual of the Rival Tribes introduces a bellicose element into the proceedings very well achieved by the timpani. One can easily visualise the various protagonists strutting their stuff around the stage! The instrumentation used in the Procession of the Sage is very effective in evoking his stature in terms of describing his solemn and almost sacred input into the proceedings. One can sense the power of his being and his great sense of presence. Everything comes to a shuddering halt in the Adoration of the Earth until the frenzy is unleashed once again in the Dance of the Earth in a way that I find very exciting.
To be is to do: Socrates
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
My thoughts on and interpretation of Part 2:
We start off in somewhat the same mode as we did at the beginning of Part 1 but this time, although we are listening to relatively quiet and sedate music, I feel that it has an ominous undertone almost like it was forewarning of something unpleasant that is soon to arrive. I also feel that the dissonances and the short, repetitive motifs all add to this sense of unease and foreboding.
We then arrive in the Mystic Circle of Young Girls where I find that the music is creating an atmosphere of enchantment but that there is also an underlying sense of apprehension; something is obviously is not quite right and I am helped by the music to feel a certain sense of expectation.
The tempo picks up when the Glorification of the Chosen One commences. The excitement quickly builds and the music is very successful in achieving a sense of drama and expectation. I really like the fanfare and the timpani in the Evocation of the Ancestors; they give such a sense of occasion.
I feel that the slow methodical, deliberate and pulsating rhythms of the music in the Ritual Action of the Ancestors serve to create tension very well. I really like the way that both the tempo and the intensity of the music both increase thereby building up this tension and then the way that it is sustained at the end of the movement.
The tension and excitement finally reaches its climax in the Sacrificial Dance. Once again I like those deliberate and pulsating rhythms in the final movement and I really think that the dissonances create a great sense of drama. The relentless rhythms and dark undertones of the dissonances really create an eerie scene for me of an inevitable force driving something to its ultimate destruction and I feel that the final chord really brings the proceeding to its inevitable conclusion.
We start off in somewhat the same mode as we did at the beginning of Part 1 but this time, although we are listening to relatively quiet and sedate music, I feel that it has an ominous undertone almost like it was forewarning of something unpleasant that is soon to arrive. I also feel that the dissonances and the short, repetitive motifs all add to this sense of unease and foreboding.
We then arrive in the Mystic Circle of Young Girls where I find that the music is creating an atmosphere of enchantment but that there is also an underlying sense of apprehension; something is obviously is not quite right and I am helped by the music to feel a certain sense of expectation.
The tempo picks up when the Glorification of the Chosen One commences. The excitement quickly builds and the music is very successful in achieving a sense of drama and expectation. I really like the fanfare and the timpani in the Evocation of the Ancestors; they give such a sense of occasion.
I feel that the slow methodical, deliberate and pulsating rhythms of the music in the Ritual Action of the Ancestors serve to create tension very well. I really like the way that both the tempo and the intensity of the music both increase thereby building up this tension and then the way that it is sustained at the end of the movement.
The tension and excitement finally reaches its climax in the Sacrificial Dance. Once again I like those deliberate and pulsating rhythms in the final movement and I really think that the dissonances create a great sense of drama. The relentless rhythms and dark undertones of the dissonances really create an eerie scene for me of an inevitable force driving something to its ultimate destruction and I feel that the final chord really brings the proceeding to its inevitable conclusion.
To be is to do: Socrates
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
The Philharmonia Orchestra under Salonen really play this piece very well. The performance is well recorded and there is a good balance between the strings and the brass and woodwinds. They also capture both the sense of excitement and menace very well and they produce a great dynamic range. Salonen has everything under control and directs a tight performance of controlled aggression which definitely adds to the atmosphere of excitement. A notable performer in this recording is the timpanist who does a great job in helping to create atmosphere. The pace of this performance, at just over 32 minutes, is well judged and as the music is continually moved along (but never rushed) this adds to the sense of drama, expectation and excitement.
To be is to do: Socrates
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
Re: July : Stravinsky : Rite of Spring
The Cleveland Orchestra under Boulez also play very well and the recorded sound is top quality. However I find that this version does not have the same bite, the same aggression as the Salonen version. Yes, every detail is present in the Boulez version but it is lacking in a direct comparison with the Salonen in terms of raw energy; not by much but enough to definitely notice a difference in my opinion. The pacing is much the same with two noticeable exceptions in the Boulez version. These things are always subjective and in any A/B test one’s subconscious preferences will inexplicably prefer one interpretation over another based on subtleties. This is by no means a poor interpretation. It is very good overall but choices are made on details. Perhaps I find it just a shade too polished and civilised (not in all movements) when compared with the Salonen....which is a very interesting outcome for me! One gets less of a feeling of restraint and more a sense of high pitched frenzy with Salonen.
To be is to do: Socrates
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra
To do is to be: Sartre
Do be do be do: Sinatra