Stravinsky: (The) Rite of the Spring [SACD]

Advantages: You will hear a landmark in music history
Disadvantages: Can be frightening for those only used to Bach

...Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971), is best known for his ground-breaking and hugely influential music for ballet. Indeed, 'The Rite of Spring' or 'Le Sacre du Printemps' is perhaps the best example of Stravinsky's challenging and provocative interpretation of the 'Brave New World'. 'The Rite' was premiered in the Theatre des Champs-Elysees in Paris (1913), and it all started well as a seemingly innocent bassoon melody floated out from the orchestral pit. What was to follow, however, was to shock and enrage the unprepared Parisian audience: pagan content, ritual sacrifice, wild choreography, savage and hugely unconventional music. This moment is a milestone in music history, and heralded (along with Schoenberg) a transformation in music: whilst once thought of as horrific, Stravinsky's music is now admired and is still perpetually... Read review

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Advantages: Music of tremendous power and excitement
Disadvantages: You could annoy the neighbours

...of musical history took a sudden lurch in a new direction. And it caused a riot. The event promised to be a pleasant evening out at the ballet at the Champs-Elysees Theatre in Paris. A young composer, Igor Stravinsky, already popular through his ballet music for The Firebird and Petrouchka, had written a new ballet, Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring.). The great Ballets Russes, formed four years earlier by Sergei Diaghilev, was to perform the ballet and a large audience turned up, looking forward no doubt to a charming, colourful spectacle and to some wonderful Russian music. Stravinsky had, after all, been a pupil of the great Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov, a composer of highly colourful music including Sheherazade and The Flight of the Bumblebee. And young Igor Stravinsky had been his most gifted student. The choreography... Read review

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Advantages: Two orchestras, one conductor, great selection of pieces
Disadvantages: None

...Kent Nagano, the Japanese conductor is the binding factor in this collection of orchestral works by Stravinsky. What we have here is neither a complete collection, nor a definitive performance, however youshould not be put off unduly by those facts. The pairing of two of his most famous pieces (Rite of Spring and Firebird) with two lesser known works is a clever piece of production as the two heavyweight bruisers are complimented beautifully by the lighter pieces. In so doing you get a sense of the range of Stravinsky's sound world and flexibility, and even a hint of his genius. Let us not forget of course, how could we, that the Rite of Spring was so controversial when new, that it's first performance was accompanied by boos and hostile jeers. This was the age of dawning modernism and where better to see the clash between... Read review

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