Album insights
Throughout his life, Igor Stravinsky remained deeply connected to the piano. From his earliest works in childhood to some preliminary sketches for a piano sonata left incomplete at the time of his death in 1971, the composer was rarely far from a piano. His piano works often served as harbingers of larger and more well-known compositions, introducing new contrapuntal structures, textures, and harmonic combinations that would later appear in symphonic and choral works. Stravinsky himself called the piano the "hub" of his compositional discoveries. In essence, compared to some of his major works like "The Rite of Spring," the "Symphony of Psalms," and the "Symphony in Three Movements," his piano literature (including the pieces played here) is often unjustly overlooked. These piano works are not only significant on their own but also shed new light on Stravinsky's continuous compositional evolution.
Stravinsky's arrangement of the Volga Boatmen's Song is designed for wind instruments and percussion, capturing the ancient spirit of a nation possessing relentless resolve. Over time, this iconic Russian folk song piqued the interest of many composers, with Mili Balakirev's arrangement perhaps being the most famous. Stravinsky, in his Swiss exile during World War I, felt nostalgic for his lost homeland, evident in a series of compositions based on folk tales he encountered in his youth. The February Revolution of 1917 remained vivid in his memory, making his recollections particularly vivid. Allegedly, the composer created the arrangement of the Volga melody as a favor to Sergei Diaghilev. The Impresario of the Ballets Russes needed a new piece to replace the traditional Russian national anthem, "God Save the Tsar," played before performances. However, the request for a new anthem actually came directly from the newly established Russian parliament. Stravinsky's manuscript reveals that he originally referred to the piece as "Hymne à la Nouvelle Russie." Orchestrating the famous song literally overnight, Stravinsky dictated the parts to his friend Ernest Ansermet, who obediently transcribed every note. A vivid red banner designed by Stravinsky's friend Picasso in recognition of the Russian Revolution adorns the title page of the manuscript.
In addition to his roles as a composer and conductor, for nearly three decades, Stravinsky assumed the role of a traveling concert pianist. His piano works were tailored for his unusually large hands, distinctly crafted, and often remarkably challenging. The composer performed with characteristic fervor, dedicating many hours honing his pianistic skills, concurrently studying with the renowned educator Isidore Philipp. Due to his concerns about others excessively exploiting the emotional aspects of his works, Stravinsky often retained exclusive public performance rights for years before allowing others to perform his piano works.
The Apollonian virtues of clarity and austerity in Neoclassicism to which the composer was naturally drawn are evident in his significant Octet for winds from 1923. Following the Octet came the Concerto for Piano and Winds, where the piano takes on a virtuosic solo role alongside an equally significant wind ensemble (excluding strings, except for double basses). Completed in Biarritz in 1923/24, the Piano Concerto was dedicated to Natalie Koussevitzky, whose husband, Sergei Koussevitzky, conducted the premiere in Paris in May 1924—Stravinsky played the solo part. The three-movement work commences with a Largo in the style of a French overture. The stylized dotted rhythms swiftly transition into a mechanistic Allegro reminiscent of the propulsive movements found in Bach's English Suites and Partitas for keyboard instruments. The form of the first movement is akin to the classical concerto structure, including a developmental middle section unmistakably harkening to Czerny's and Hanon's piano studies, familiar to all aspiring pianists. The recapitulation segues into a rhythmically complex, jazz-like piano cadenza evocative of Gershwin, showcasing Stravinsky's enthusiasm for American jazz and particularly Ragtime. The movement closes by returning to the initial material with the dignified air of a French overture.
Initially intended as Larghissimo, the middle movement was revised in 1950 to become a Largo. This movement embodies a wonderfully cheerful, cantabile piano style not often found in Stravinsky's 1920s music. Marked with highly unusual rubato indications, the two melismatic cadenzas in the movement reflect a highly ornate pianistic technique reminiscent of the slow movements from early Beethoven sonatas.
The concluding Allegro commences with percussive material constructed from empty fourths and fifths. This movement represents a satirical pastiche incorporating coffeehouse melodies, jazz rhythms, and even a baroque-like fughetta emerging unexpectedly. Overall, the movement bears a close relationship to 18th-century keyboard toccatas, characterized by rapid shifts between contrasting and seemingly unrelated materials. Stravinsky performed the work almost 50 times over the following years, its success inspiring further compositions for solo piano, two pianos, piano and orchestra, as well as piano and violin.
The Capriccio for Piano and Orchestra was predominantly composed in Nice in 1928/29 and serves as Stravinsky's second piano concerto of sorts. The audience eagerly anticipated the composer as the performer of his own works, often pushing him to create a successor to his Piano Concerto for Winds. Indeed, Stravinsky's prowess as a pianist was in such high demand that he could only compose sporadically, depending on his concert tours. The Capriccio, the sole composition from 1929, is roughly the same length as the preceding concerto, yet it distinguishes itself significantly. Here, Stravinsky employs a full orchestra instead of a wind ensemble, fully utilizing the added string section. Moreover, the piano part deviates notably from that of the earlier concerto. While the outer movements of the concerto were rooted in the natural percussiveness of the piano, the Capriccio is much more lyrical. While traces of the confident style found in works like the Octet and the Piano Concerto for Winds remain, the melodic style of the Capriccio primarily reflects Stravinsky's latest works, notably the two important ballets "Apollo" and "The Fairy's Kiss." As for the title, the composer noted in "Chronicles of My Life" that he had planned a fantasy—a freely structured form allowing for a more spontaneous, unpredictable style of composition.
The first movement opens with an introduction labeled Presto, swiftly transitioning into the main material of the movement. Here, the piano explores the entire keyboard in an infinite, continuously expansive manner. The pianist barely has a moment to breathe, sculpting the long, resonant lines from start to finish as part of a unified fabric. The movement concludes with a reprisal of the initial material.
Titled Andante rapsodico, the middle movement showcases the composer employing an almost improvisational style filled with rapid rhythmic figurations in groups of 9, 11, and 13 tones. The resulting fantasies evoke the highly ornamented style of Carl Maria von Weber, under whose influence Stravinsky found himself at the time, as documented in his Chronicles.
This second movement seamlessly transitions without pause into the finale, Allegro capriccioso ma tempo giusto, which inspired the title of the work as this third movement was actually composed first. The form (that of a classical rondo) is strictly observed here. The perpetuum mobile propels the movement forward, ingeniously interwoven into both the piano part and the orchestral accompaniment.
The piece premiered in Paris in December as part of a symphony concert with Stravinsky on piano and his friend Ernest Ansermet conducting; the composer revised the work in 1949 but made only minor changes. Almost forty years after the premiere, Capriccio found new life in a different setting: in 1968, Stravinsky's music was featured as a "Ruby Section" in George Balanchine's ballet—a perennial favorite production of the New York City Ballet.
"Movements" was completed in late July 1959 and was until then the composer's most intricate serial work—his "most advanced music," as noted in his memoirs. This biting, compactly structured piece is scored for piano and orchestra—including harp and celesta—and grants the solo piano the most prominent role. Initially dubbed Concerto for Piano and Instrument Groups, Stravinsky soon discarded this title as the piano here does not play the same role as in his earlier two works for piano and orchestra. The piano's usage is more compressed, positioning it as a contributor within the chamber music framework it inhabits.
The piano appears to have been elevated to a soloist role after Swiss magnate Karl Weber commissioned a piano work from Stravinsky for his wife, Margrit. "Movements" premiered in New York's Town Hall in January 1960 with Weber at the piano and the 78-year-old Stravinsky conducting. Originally comprised of five short movements (each without titles but marked only with metronome indications), with four even shorter interludes labeled as "Interludes" and containing just a few bars without the piano (these headings were omitted when the work was published). Essentially, the piece serves as a lexicon of serial techniques: inversions, retrogrades, hexachordic transpositions, and combinatorial segmentations—all within an unmistakably pointillistic orchestral structure. Stravinsky's study of Krenek's music and Stockhausen's piano works at that time significantly influenced him. The