When Igor Stravinsky premiered ‘The Rite of Spring’ in 1913, he provoked a riot in the Parisi audience. His audacious music was unlike anything they had heard before. What was behind Stravinsky’s creative leap – and can such musical Genius ever be fully understood?
In its time, Stravinsky’s ballet The Rite of Spring (Le Sacre du Printemps) was truly shocking because it so blatantly challenged musical orthodoxy. Instead of regular, flowing phrases and smooth key progressions, it juxtaposed uneven fragments in unrelated keys over a brutal, stamping pulse. Yet despite the booing of the majority of the audience, there were some, even on that first night, who recognized it as a work of Genius. Stravinsky’s raw materials were the same as those available to any other composer – the instruments of the orchestra. What he did was rewrite the rule book, throwing out all the old certainties and profoundly influencing the composers who came after him.
The Elements of Genius
The Rite of Spring was undoubtedly the work of an original thinker. Such creative Genius relies on drive and ability, and Stravinsky had plenty of both. He was certainly singularly driven – being compelled to write even in the days following his daughter’s death. He also had the self-confidence to face the critics. This was earned, at least in part, through his extensive musical training. The son of a leading bass singer at the Imperial Opera, he was initially a self-taught musician. As a blossoming composer in his twenties, he took lessons with the gifted orchestrator Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.
The Rite of Spring represented a creative leap – but Stravinsky had leaped from somewhere: his base was the Romantic and nationalistic music of his time. There are many touches of sumptuous orchestration in The Rite of Spring, as well as snatches of folk music from Stravinsky’s native Russia. Stravinsky also had the good fortune to live in bourgeois Paris at the beginning of the twentieth century, where he mixed with avant-garde artists, including Picasso and Cocteau. Replacing Romantic formalism with new forms of expression, these original thinkers both encouraged and influenced Stravinsky’s work. Stravinsky possessed the background, the training, the dedication, and the inspiration to write splendid, original music. But do these qualities qualify him as a Genius – or was there another mysterious ingredient?
Hidden workings
Music is a mathematical art – rhythms, harmony, and structure are all based on numbers. When scholars analyze the work of great composers, it is tempting to think they will discover the formula for musical Genius hidden within the notes. But Genius is not so easy to pin down. Stravinsky’s work has been extensively analyzed, but attempts to create a ‘new’ Stravinsky by following a set of rules have not convinced the critics. Stravinsky himself claimed that he had no rational formula for writing his music. He said that it came to him instinctively – he used his ear rather than any established musical rules to determine the notes.
In common with many other geniuses, Stravinsky had a restless mind, reinventing himself several times throughout his life. Soon after composing The Rite of Spring, he began writing sparse parodies of Baroque dance music. He went through a further metamorphosis in the 1950s, dabbling in the highly structured serial music invented by his rival Arnold Schoenberg. A century later, The Rite of Spring can still move and unsettle an audience. And while we can admire and analyze the work of great composers like Stravinsky, it may still be many years before we discover the basis of musical Genius.
Absolute Music
While some composers work by extemporizing – playing with ideas using real instruments – others experiment in their heads. Music that is imagined is free from the constraints imposed by actually playing an instrument, but only the most experienced and gifted musicians are able to work in this way.
Sometimes, composers imagine music that is beyond the capability of any human performer. Such work is known as ‘absolute music.’ Claude Debussy’s piano repertoire features impossibly quiet dynamics: in his Image No. 5: And the Moon Descends Over the Temple That Was; he instructs the pianist to play a chain of nine-note chords that stretch almost six octaves across the keyboard.
Chords of this size are difficult to play quietly, but Debussy wants them to start pianissimo (very quietly) and then gradually diminuendo (become even softer). In the early 18th century, JS Bach created absolute music for woodwind: his Partita for Flute has long, fast-moving passages without any rests. Players must decide how to break up their imagined, perfect musical line to take a breath. In the recording studio, however, these limits are removed: today’s sound editing technology can make the most challenging piece a reality.
