Stravinsky’s first visit to Argentina in 1936 caused a sensation.
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This April 6 marks half a century since the death of Gor Fidorovich Stravinsky, brilliant Russian composer and conductor, author of the famous “The Rite of Spring” and one of the most important, vital and transcendent musicians of the 20th century.
The creator of other popular and iconic pieces like “The Firebird” (1910) and “Petrushka” (1911), died in New York at the age of 88 and was buried in Venice on the island of the San Michele cemetery.
Stravinsky was born on June 17, 1882 in Oranienbaum; son of a pear singer, from his childhood he took private piano lessons. From 1903 to 1905 he studied composition under the tutelage of Nicoli Rimski Korsakov. In 1910 he changed his habitual residence, first to Europe and then to the United States.
The Rite of Spring
Throughout his life, composed more than 120 works, crossed by styles such as primitivism, neoclassicism and serialism, however it is known worldwide especially for the trilogue of the so-called Russian period – “The Firebird”, “Petrushka” and “The Rite of Spring” – classic, daring and innovative ballets that are referred to as reinventions of the genre.
The Argentine musician and cultural manager Martn Bauer, current director of the Experimental pear teacher at the National University of Tres de Febrero (Untref) considers consulted by Tlam that Stravinsky “is undoubtedly, along with Arnold Schoenberg, one of the two most influential composers of the 20th century”.
“Although, unlike his colleague Viens, he neither founded a school nor had declared disciples, the emergence of his music, at the beginning of the 20th century – and especially his legendary work ‘The consecration of spring’ – generated a musical trend that still without a name, would have to affect by tacit or implicit adherence or by contrast, to all later music “Bauer emphasizes.
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In order to establish this character of the work, he points out that “It burst forth emerging from another tradition that was not the western symphony in the rhetorical sense. It did not preserve the type of structuring of the classical tradition, it did not refer to previous or known models and, from the point of view of the materials, it was totally new harmonically, instrumentally and, above all, rhythmically “.
Stravinsky and Argentina
Since its creation, the person who directs the “Coln Contemporneo” program of the maximum Argentine coliseum was general and artistic director of the Argentine Theater of La Plata (2015-2019), and created and directed the Contemporary Music Concert Cycle of the San Martin Theater in its first 20 seasons, abound that “In Stravinsky’s music there was something wild, a mixture of something primitive and an extraordinary degree of stylization that denoted his great technical level and talent”.
Bridging these creations to our country, Bauer points out that “For Argentines, their music also had an additional interest: it was passionately disseminated by Victoria Ocampo – a lucky spectator of the scandalous Parisian premiere of ‘The Rite of Spring’ in 1913 – who quickly detected that she had heard a musical miracle”.
Together with Beatriz Sarlo, Bauer captured the story of the friendship between Ocampo and Stravinsky in the show “VO”, which premiered at the Centro de Experimentacin Teatro Coln in July 2013.
In the portal Russia Beyond The musician’s first visit to Argentina is reviewed, in 1936, an event that “caused a sensation”.
“The dear visitor received innumerable welcome telegrams from the most representative personalities of the cultural environment, and the then director of the Coln Opera-Theater, Athos Palma, went in person to meet Stravinski in the Uruguayan capital”, if it evokes all.
Among the concerts offered by Stravinsky as conductor and pianist, was “Persphone”, a melodrama written by the composer with text by Andr Gide, of which Jorge Luis Borges was in charge of the Spanish translation and Victoria Ocampo served as narrator.
In the foreword to the first edition of Stravinsky’s biography “Chronicles of my life”, published by the Sur publishing house, Ocampo wrote: “From the first contact, the harshness, the extraordinary rhythmic violence of the ‘Consecration …’ spoke to me of a genius” and perhaps that is why he referred to the musician as “my first great modern love”.
In 1960, at the age of 78, Stravinsky returned to Buenos Aires for a Mozarteum cycle. On August 29, during a report they asked him what he thought of Latin America and he replied: “The first thing is that some hotel rooms are too old and some are too new. The deserts and the jungles, with their extreme climate … And the faces of the symphonic orchestras, which seem to have come out of the tombs of the Incas … And nationalism; every country hates its neighbor “.
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