100 Years Ago Today

Stravinsky's Rite of Spring had its riotous premier at the Champs Elysee Theater in Paris.  Stravinsky never wrote anything like this again.

And this performance by Seiji Ozawa and the Chicago Philharmonic from 1968 remains one of my favorites.












This piece is now 100 years old, and I've loved it for about 40 of those years.  I first heard it when I was about 15.  I've loved it ever since.

Familiarity is the acid test of art.  Lots of musical works, plays, paintings, etc. had spectacular premiers only to die quickly;  too cerebral and personal to mean much to anyone other than a handful of initiates, or a lot of dramatic flash whose novelty wore off too quickly.  This work endures.  Its power to startle and to move remains undiminished by time.  After about 40 years, I still fall under the spell of this ballet  as much as I did when I was in my teens.

Dancers in costume from the original 1913 production

Stravinsky and Nijinsky

EXTRA:


Here is the Joffrey Ballet's 1987 reconstruction of the original 1913 production with Nijinsky's choreography and sets and costumes designed by Nicolai Roerich.