The thing about Pierre Monteux's May 29, 1913 premiere of Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring), by Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris for Serge Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, is that it's not just the anniversary of the first time a famous piece was played in public. It's the anniversary of the most famous scandal in music history (and ballet history).
The audience was so violently divided in their opinions of the performance that there was an actual riot; there are widely disparate accounts of the evening, and some say the police removed some audience members, so contentious did things become. The orchestra was bombarded with projectiles, and the audience's vocal disapproval (combined with Rite supporters' vocal disapproval of the anti-Rite faction's demonstrations) drowned out the music often enough that the choreographer, Vaslav Nijinsky, had to spend much of the performance standing in the wings shouting directions to the dancers,...
The audience was so violently divided in their opinions of the performance that there was an actual riot; there are widely disparate accounts of the evening, and some say the police removed some audience members, so contentious did things become. The orchestra was bombarded with projectiles, and the audience's vocal disapproval (combined with Rite supporters' vocal disapproval of the anti-Rite faction's demonstrations) drowned out the music often enough that the choreographer, Vaslav Nijinsky, had to spend much of the performance standing in the wings shouting directions to the dancers,...
- 5/30/2013
- by SteveHoltje
- www.culturecatch.com
When Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) was 20, and mostly known to audiences as a pianist, Robert Schumann basically proclaimed him the great hope of German music in an article entitled "New Paths." In those days, the general lament was that no symphonist had been able to measure up to the mighty example of Beethoven. He started composing what could have become his first symphony in 1854; he got cold feet and turned it into his Piano Concerto No. 1, which was premiered in 1859. In that same period, Brahms wrote two Serenades for orchestra -- seemingly to practice dealing with the challenges of those forces -- and his String Sextet No. 1, a fairly grand work for a chamber piece. In 1862 he sent to Clara Schumann (Robert's widow, whom he loved) an early version of the first movement of what he announced would be his First Symphony (it did not yet have its glorious introduction). A decade later,...
- 11/5/2011
- by SteveHoltje
- www.culturecatch.com
This is a polished but unmoving account of the affair between two 20th-century greats
There's a wonderful moment in Clint Eastwood's Bird, when Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie make an expedition one night to the Los Angeles home of their idol, Igor Stravinsky. They ring the bell at the front garden gate and stand in the shadows, afraid to approach the great man when he appears in the doorway in that famous hook-nosed silhouette. You sense their awe in the presence of a God‑like figure who still answers his own doorbell.
Adapted by the British writer Chris Greenhalgh from his speculative novel, Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky takes us back to the second decade of the 20th century, when the basis of the Stravinsky legend was being laid and more or less to the point where last year's Coco Before Chanel ends. The movie begins with one of the epic moments of cultural modernism,...
There's a wonderful moment in Clint Eastwood's Bird, when Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie make an expedition one night to the Los Angeles home of their idol, Igor Stravinsky. They ring the bell at the front garden gate and stand in the shadows, afraid to approach the great man when he appears in the doorway in that famous hook-nosed silhouette. You sense their awe in the presence of a God‑like figure who still answers his own doorbell.
Adapted by the British writer Chris Greenhalgh from his speculative novel, Coco Chanel & Igor Stravinsky takes us back to the second decade of the 20th century, when the basis of the Stravinsky legend was being laid and more or less to the point where last year's Coco Before Chanel ends. The movie begins with one of the epic moments of cultural modernism,...
- 8/7/2010
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
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