Sunday Classics: In "The Firebird," Stravinsky's genius exploded on the international stage

The composer conducts the New Philharmonia Orchestra in the final eight minutes or so, the "Berceuse" and "Final Hymn," from his Firebird (in the form of his 1945 suite), in London's Royal Festival Hall in 1965.

"Mark the young composer well. He is a man on the brink of celebrity."

-- Sergei Diaghilev, legendary impresario of the Ballets
Russes, during June 1910 rehearsals for The Firebird

by Ken

You can read the history books to learn how young Igor Stravinsky came to be commissioned to compose The Firebird. The result certainly bore out the prediction of Diaghilev, who went on to commission two more ballets from the young composer: Petrushka and The Rite of Spring. And in the process the history of 20th-century music was changed.

Musically and temperamentally The Firebird undoubtedly looks backward as much as forward, steeped as it is in the passionate Russian Romanticism of Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov. And so it's not always considered entirely reputable by ardent Stravinskyites. I love the piece unabashedly and unapologetically, though, and hope I've whetted your appetite for it with our previews: Friday night's, focusing on how the ballet starts (with Fireworks thrown in as a bonus), and last night's focusing on how it ends (with the Scherzo à la russe as a bonus).

Today we're just going to plunge into the thing, using as a rather sneaky point of entry the various paths Stravinsky himself laid out for audiences: in addition to the complete ballet, which he didn't think really suitable for concert purposes, the second and third of the three suites he arranged from it.

I'm not a dance person, and really don't think of Stravinsky's ballets in dance terms. But I thought it might be interesting to start out with a reminder that this music was after all written to be danced to.


The opening of The Firebird, with Nina Ananiashvili as the Firebird and Andris Liepa as Ivan Tsarevich, from a film performance by Liepa's dance troupe with the Bolshoi Theater Orchestra conducted by Andrei Chistiakov, which is available on DVD and complete-in-chunks on YouTube. On the other side of the click-through we're going to see the other end of the ballet.


COMING UP: MORE DANCING, AND THE 1911 AND THE LONGER
1919 SUITES, PLUS THE WHOLE SHEBANG -- JUST CLICK HERE

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