On May 29th 1913, Stravinsky's ballet, The Rite of Spring, was first performed at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris, conducted by Pierre Monteux and danced by the Ballets Russes with choreography by Vaslav Nijinsky. Telling the story of a wild pagan ritual (including the sacrifice of a young girl), the music was rhythmic and savage, the dance primitive, violent, deliberately ungainly. The first notes of the bassoon had the audience booing the orchestra. There was catcalls and whistles, loud arguments between those who liked and disliked the work. Stravinsky fled the theatre, heading backstage where the founder of the Ballet Russes, Sergei Diaghilev was turning the lights on and off in an effort to calm the audience and Nijinsky was shouting counts to the dancers who could not hear the orchestra over the din, balanced on a chair and leaning out so far that Stravinsky had to catch hold of his coattails to keep him from toppling over.
The audience rioted.
The music and dance was not what they had expected to see. It was experimental and challenging and the audience reacted strongly against it. While there is little doubt that social and political pressures contributed to the riot (which was quelled in a rather limited way when the police showed up in intermission), it was certainly the unfamiliar and challenging nature of the music that sparked it off and it is the music that continues to be considered the primary causes of the riot.
I've loved this story since the first time I heard it from Anne Collett during one of the lectures in her course on Modernist literature during my first year of English Studies at university. For me it says that art moves people. And not just what art has to say (as can be shown by reaction against the work of Salman Rushdie, for instance) but also the structure of art. The way it is created.
To me, one of the defining features of art is that it be a blend of aesthetics and meaning. Like Keats famously writes in 'Ode on a Grecian Urn',
And this speaks to the core of modernism (and something that post-modernism misses, of course, in its rush to experiment for the sake of experimentation) which is about one of the reasons why experimentation is important in art. It is experimentation in structure that keeps art fresh and new and challenging. It shocks the audience out of their complacency and makes them think about what's before them. Sometimes it's successful (like imagism or surrealism) and so eventually becomes almost mainstream. Sometimes it's like Dada and remains an interesting quirk of history. But part of the the intent is to present a new experience, to speak in a new way and so get people to think about what is presented, about what the artist has to say.
The Rite of Spring completed its run without further incident and, while Nijinsky's choreography is now long lost, the music is a favourite amongst dance troupes the world over. Neither Stravinsky nor Nijinsky created works in the same percussive style again but this one work has had huge influence. Even Disney's Fantasia uses the music of the ballet, accompanying it with an animation depicting the rise and fall of the dinosaurs. (This actually created another piece of controversy associated with the work: though he gave permission for them to use the music and seemed happy enough with what they planned to do - so much so that he gave them permission to later use The Firebird in a similar manner -, Stravinsky was unimpressed with the finished product, describing the whole as 'execrable' and stating that they had seriously misunderstood his work.) Few people today would consider Stravinsky's score to be revolutionary or particularly unusual. But, at its first performance, it was so experimental, so unfamiliar and challenging, that the audience didn't know how to react.
The audience rioted.
The music and dance was not what they had expected to see. It was experimental and challenging and the audience reacted strongly against it. While there is little doubt that social and political pressures contributed to the riot (which was quelled in a rather limited way when the police showed up in intermission), it was certainly the unfamiliar and challenging nature of the music that sparked it off and it is the music that continues to be considered the primary causes of the riot.
I've loved this story since the first time I heard it from Anne Collett during one of the lectures in her course on Modernist literature during my first year of English Studies at university. For me it says that art moves people. And not just what art has to say (as can be shown by reaction against the work of Salman Rushdie, for instance) but also the structure of art. The way it is created.
To me, one of the defining features of art is that it be a blend of aesthetics and meaning. Like Keats famously writes in 'Ode on a Grecian Urn',
Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is allArt means beautifully and how art expresses itself is as important as what it expresses. The aesthetics of the work are, in fact, an important part of what the work has to say. It doesn't have to be pretty - I think it was Picasso who said, "The ugly can sometimes be beautiful. The pretty never." - but it does have to have impact that matches its message.
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.
And this speaks to the core of modernism (and something that post-modernism misses, of course, in its rush to experiment for the sake of experimentation) which is about one of the reasons why experimentation is important in art. It is experimentation in structure that keeps art fresh and new and challenging. It shocks the audience out of their complacency and makes them think about what's before them. Sometimes it's successful (like imagism or surrealism) and so eventually becomes almost mainstream. Sometimes it's like Dada and remains an interesting quirk of history. But part of the the intent is to present a new experience, to speak in a new way and so get people to think about what is presented, about what the artist has to say.
The Rite of Spring completed its run without further incident and, while Nijinsky's choreography is now long lost, the music is a favourite amongst dance troupes the world over. Neither Stravinsky nor Nijinsky created works in the same percussive style again but this one work has had huge influence. Even Disney's Fantasia uses the music of the ballet, accompanying it with an animation depicting the rise and fall of the dinosaurs. (This actually created another piece of controversy associated with the work: though he gave permission for them to use the music and seemed happy enough with what they planned to do - so much so that he gave them permission to later use The Firebird in a similar manner -, Stravinsky was unimpressed with the finished product, describing the whole as 'execrable' and stating that they had seriously misunderstood his work.) Few people today would consider Stravinsky's score to be revolutionary or particularly unusual. But, at its first performance, it was so experimental, so unfamiliar and challenging, that the audience didn't know how to react.
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