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20th-Century Composers
[(Igor Stravinsky )] [Author: Michael Oliver] [Apr-2008]
From his unhappy childhood in St. Petersburg through his years in Paris and the United States, from The Nightingale through The Owl and the Pussycat, British writer Michael Oliver traces the life and work of Igor Stravinsky. His landmark ballet, The Rite of Spring is thought of as a classic today, but it inspired riots at its Paris premiere in 1913. Oliver follows Stravinsky's work from juvenilia through modernism and serialism and back to tonalism in an easily accessible biography, part of the Phaidon Press Limited 20th Century Composers series. This book, which never gets too technical, makes a good start for anyone with a growing interest in Stravinsky and his music. There is a guide to his works and to other biographies in the back of the book.
- GenresMusic
Paperback
First published January 7, 1995
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36 people want to read
About the author
Michael Oliver
3 books1 followerMichael Oliver was a writer and broadcaster, having written and comp. hundreds of documentaries, and magazine programmes about music for BBC Radio 3, and written regularly for Gramophone, etc.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
December 23, 2023
Oliver won me over in the Preface when he says that he discovered Stravinsky at 12-13 years old and intuited just how great his music was. My father gave me a recording of Petrushka (Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Igor Stravinsky conducting) when I was 13, and I fell hard for it. I had never heard anything so challenging and enchanting before, and it completely changed the way I listened to music and the music I listened to. I opened up to a lot more. I wanted to be open, looking for that peak experience. And my interest in pop music, of whatever stripe, just dried up. I found "The Firebird" and "The Rite of Spring" soon thereafter, and I’ve listened to his three early ballets very regularly ever since. I have only listened sporadically to some of his other works, like "The Soldier’s Tale," but not with much attention. I have wanted to listen to Stravinsky more systematically for years, and I have wanted to read something as a guide. I’ve had Michael Oliver’s book for awhile now, and I am glad that I’ve unearthed it.
"Igor Stravinsky" is a well crafted biography, written for a not particularly musical lay reader like me. It is not too long, doesn’t go into much biographical and musical detail, and doesn’t require too much knowledge of music. It’s a Mother Bear of a biography.
Oliver writes broad and insightful sketches throughout: far more than good album notes can offer but less than a thorough scholarly biography. That said, this book has a useful index, a list of works, a selected discography, and a list of further readings. It sets me up nicely for further explorations of Stravinsky.
I had not known that Stravinsky was brought up in a musical family. His father was an important opera singer, and his mother a pianist. While his parents didn’t pay much attention to their son’s musical talents, membres of their musical circle–particularly, Rimsky-Korsakov–did. Stravinsky was fortunate to be raised in the Russian (St. Petersburg, Moscow) classical community, where he learned Russian traditions, Russian folk music, and western classical music as well.
What I find most fascinating about this biography or Stravinsky’s life is his mobility, which is complicated by two world wars and the Russian Revolution. As Oliver speaks about it, movement is growth. If Stravinsky had stayed in St. Petersburg, he might have become simply a national composer. Fortunately, Diaghilev heard a couple of Stravinsky’s early pieces and then commissioned him to write the music for the ballet "The Firebird," which was based on a Russian folk-tale. "The Firebird" premiered in Paris in 1910, not St. Petersburg, and Stravinsky’s career went global. "Petrushka" followed in 1911, and "The Rite of Spring" in 1913. It would have been amazing to have been in Paris during those years to see and hear how not only Stravinsky’s work developed but how the Parisian artistic and cultural milieu aided and accelerated Stravinsky’s talents, vision, and opportunities. Oliver makes clear that from the 1910s to the end of the 1930s, Paris and western Europe attracted a proliferation of talent that produced the opportunities for an unprecedented creative culture. Stravinsky could not have become what he became without all the creative people he worked with(e.g., Njinski, Cocteau, Satie, Picasso). To offer a parallel, without his time in Europe during WWI and into the 1920s, Jorge Luis Borges would not have become the writer that he became after his return to Buenos Aires. Creativity is a fascinating process. Although coming from a very different cultural space, avant garde jazz composer Henry Threadgill’s discussion of his creative process in "Easily Slip into Another World: A Life in Music"–all the creative people he came to know and opportunities he pursued–is very similar to what Oliver does here for Stravinsky.
I have not paid much attention to Stravinsky’s post-Rite music, because it’s been dubbed Neo-Classical and none of it seemed as wild and avant as the first three ballets. Oliver makes clear that after WWI Stravinsky’s style changes because 1) he’s not going to reproduce the wildness of Rite and 2) the opportunities he finds takes him other places to explore other forms and push/play with other limits. In other words, while Stravinsky’s post-Rite music is not as wild he is still fully engaged in the creative process, exploring musical opportunities he hadn’t yet explored. ←As I listen to more Stravinsky, and listen to him throughout his career, I’ll keep this in mind.
With the coming of WWII, Stravinsky moves to the US, which he finds both inviting and challenging. First, he finds himself part of the expat milieu of composers, artists, musicians, writers, and intellectuals who are escaping the war. Just as Paris provided Stravinsky with a creative culture on which to build his career, so now does the expat milieu in Southern California. Key for Stravinsky, though, is the relationship he develops with the young American composer, Robert Craft, who is steeped in the European avant garde and becomes Stravinsky’s assistant, exposing Stravinsky more than he had before to Schonberg and the serialists. Stravinsky gives over Neo-Classical compositions to become a belated serialist, although not following strictly Schonberg’s chromatic 12 tone row. Again, this is another set of Stravinsky’s work that I had not paid attention to, because it seemed retrograde–as if Stravinsky is finally catching up with Schonberg. Again, following Oliver’s guidance, I need to listen to his late works, keeping in mind the influence of Kraft and the opportunities that Stravinsky sees for using serialism to extend his creative engagement with composition. Second, in the US Stravinsky needed to rethink his income stream to pay his bills. After the war, commissions and compositions make him a lot less money in the US, while conducting gigs make him a lot more. His celebrity status is as a conductor and composer of "The Firebird," "Petrushka," and "The Rite of Spring" not so much as a working composer, which he still is.
This is a simplification, but over the course of his life there were three Stravinskies: A Russian Stravinsky, a European Stravinsky, and an American Stravinsky, each building off the other, adjusting to the history, the place, the people, and the sociocultural and aesthetic milieus in which Stravinsky finds himself.
Oliver does speak at some length about Stravinsky’s personal life–family, affairs, friendships, etc.--but I read over that material pretty quickly. It obviously has its impacts, influencing lots of choices Stravinsky made, but its influence on the music seems correlative rather than causal.
Excellent introductory biography.
"Igor Stravinsky" is a well crafted biography, written for a not particularly musical lay reader like me. It is not too long, doesn’t go into much biographical and musical detail, and doesn’t require too much knowledge of music. It’s a Mother Bear of a biography.
Oliver writes broad and insightful sketches throughout: far more than good album notes can offer but less than a thorough scholarly biography. That said, this book has a useful index, a list of works, a selected discography, and a list of further readings. It sets me up nicely for further explorations of Stravinsky.
I had not known that Stravinsky was brought up in a musical family. His father was an important opera singer, and his mother a pianist. While his parents didn’t pay much attention to their son’s musical talents, membres of their musical circle–particularly, Rimsky-Korsakov–did. Stravinsky was fortunate to be raised in the Russian (St. Petersburg, Moscow) classical community, where he learned Russian traditions, Russian folk music, and western classical music as well.
What I find most fascinating about this biography or Stravinsky’s life is his mobility, which is complicated by two world wars and the Russian Revolution. As Oliver speaks about it, movement is growth. If Stravinsky had stayed in St. Petersburg, he might have become simply a national composer. Fortunately, Diaghilev heard a couple of Stravinsky’s early pieces and then commissioned him to write the music for the ballet "The Firebird," which was based on a Russian folk-tale. "The Firebird" premiered in Paris in 1910, not St. Petersburg, and Stravinsky’s career went global. "Petrushka" followed in 1911, and "The Rite of Spring" in 1913. It would have been amazing to have been in Paris during those years to see and hear how not only Stravinsky’s work developed but how the Parisian artistic and cultural milieu aided and accelerated Stravinsky’s talents, vision, and opportunities. Oliver makes clear that from the 1910s to the end of the 1930s, Paris and western Europe attracted a proliferation of talent that produced the opportunities for an unprecedented creative culture. Stravinsky could not have become what he became without all the creative people he worked with(e.g., Njinski, Cocteau, Satie, Picasso). To offer a parallel, without his time in Europe during WWI and into the 1920s, Jorge Luis Borges would not have become the writer that he became after his return to Buenos Aires. Creativity is a fascinating process. Although coming from a very different cultural space, avant garde jazz composer Henry Threadgill’s discussion of his creative process in "Easily Slip into Another World: A Life in Music"–all the creative people he came to know and opportunities he pursued–is very similar to what Oliver does here for Stravinsky.
I have not paid much attention to Stravinsky’s post-Rite music, because it’s been dubbed Neo-Classical and none of it seemed as wild and avant as the first three ballets. Oliver makes clear that after WWI Stravinsky’s style changes because 1) he’s not going to reproduce the wildness of Rite and 2) the opportunities he finds takes him other places to explore other forms and push/play with other limits. In other words, while Stravinsky’s post-Rite music is not as wild he is still fully engaged in the creative process, exploring musical opportunities he hadn’t yet explored. ←As I listen to more Stravinsky, and listen to him throughout his career, I’ll keep this in mind.
With the coming of WWII, Stravinsky moves to the US, which he finds both inviting and challenging. First, he finds himself part of the expat milieu of composers, artists, musicians, writers, and intellectuals who are escaping the war. Just as Paris provided Stravinsky with a creative culture on which to build his career, so now does the expat milieu in Southern California. Key for Stravinsky, though, is the relationship he develops with the young American composer, Robert Craft, who is steeped in the European avant garde and becomes Stravinsky’s assistant, exposing Stravinsky more than he had before to Schonberg and the serialists. Stravinsky gives over Neo-Classical compositions to become a belated serialist, although not following strictly Schonberg’s chromatic 12 tone row. Again, this is another set of Stravinsky’s work that I had not paid attention to, because it seemed retrograde–as if Stravinsky is finally catching up with Schonberg. Again, following Oliver’s guidance, I need to listen to his late works, keeping in mind the influence of Kraft and the opportunities that Stravinsky sees for using serialism to extend his creative engagement with composition. Second, in the US Stravinsky needed to rethink his income stream to pay his bills. After the war, commissions and compositions make him a lot less money in the US, while conducting gigs make him a lot more. His celebrity status is as a conductor and composer of "The Firebird," "Petrushka," and "The Rite of Spring" not so much as a working composer, which he still is.
This is a simplification, but over the course of his life there were three Stravinskies: A Russian Stravinsky, a European Stravinsky, and an American Stravinsky, each building off the other, adjusting to the history, the place, the people, and the sociocultural and aesthetic milieus in which Stravinsky finds himself.
Oliver does speak at some length about Stravinsky’s personal life–family, affairs, friendships, etc.--but I read over that material pretty quickly. It obviously has its impacts, influencing lots of choices Stravinsky made, but its influence on the music seems correlative rather than causal.
Excellent introductory biography.
March 24, 2025
This handsome biography of Stravinsky comes complete with frequent photographs and is everything a fan could want. Just like Stravinsky's music, it overwhelms.
February 26, 2010
since i've long thought of "the rite of spring" as my favorite orchestral work, it seems odd that it took me this long to learn more about the life of its composer. of course i knew a bit about him prior to cracking the spine on this richly illustrated volume, but there was an immense amount of material i had not known prior. stravinsky was quite a cosmopolitan character, having lived in russia, france, switzerland, italy, and the USA. he blazed trails in 20th century musical creation while always keeping a dear place in his heart for the great works of the past, upon which he built. an impressive body of work. read this if you'd like a play by play for his life and his many works. it doesn't dig too deep into the more dismal aspects of his days, which is fine by me. sometimes biographies can focus a little too heavily on the negative. this had the right balance and wasn't too scholastic.
May 7, 2008
Phaidon is one of the greatest paperback makers ever (every page feels like a postcard) ... so that feels cool. I love stavinsky. that is all I can recollect about this read ... nothing very profound. Lots of cool pictures though.
August 31, 2012
Oppervlakkige en hier en daar nogal triviale biografie uit de 20th centry composers-serie van Phaidon. Met weinig nieuws, en weinig consistents over de muziek, maar met prachtige foto's en reproducties uit het leven van Stravinsky en in die zin schitterend gedocumenteerd.
August 29, 2012
While this read is quick and fun, it's definitely an introductory, surface-level overview of Stravinsky's life and works. A nice intro, definitely encouraging me to read more detailed material.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews