The Orchestra Project | The Rite of Spring
20 April, 2025, Verbrugghen Hall, Sydney, NSW
Igor Stravinsky was always a bit of a rebel. When he was nine, his piano teacher complained that he would not practice his designated pieces and would instead improvise. Most would take this as a sign of talent but not his parents, who refused to pay for further lessons and insisted that he study law! Igor attended few lectures however and instead enrolled for lessons in harmony and counterpoint at St Petersburg University where he came under the wing of none other than Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, and this relationship flourished to the extent that he travelled widely with the latter and for a time lived with his family while he received extensive tutelage in composition. He composed a Symphony in E flat and a Sonata premiered by Nikolai himself and was made aware of the more modernistic music of French composers such as Franck and Debussy which had a huge effect on his style of composition. This effect on his style was first emphasised by his Funeral Song following the death of his mentor and this came to the attention of Diaghilev, a Russian choreographer resident in Paris. This association and collaboration led in 1909 to the composition of the ballet The Firebird whose premiere in Paris was a huge success with full acceptance of the Avant-guard style. Petrushka which followed was equally successful and it was following a dream that The Rite of Spring based on pagan dances was born.
I have to confess that I had not heard The Rite of Spring before at a live concert and it is even more striking. Wild rhythms abound while discords are prominent yet fully absorbed by the nature of the music. For the first time, Stravinsky makes use of the twelve-note scale championed by Schoenberg while the percussionists have an unmatched workout. In the quieter episodes, there are intriguing scales on the bassoons and brass. It is widely known that the first performance in Paris gave rise to rioting between factions appreciating or decrying the revolutionary nature of the music. Did Stravinsky perhaps have a premonition of the disastrous World War which was to follow?
A packed audience at Verbrugghen Hall went wild with enthusiasm – once it had got its breath back.
Ravel’s La Valse was also experimental – perhaps satirising the imperialistic nature of the dance form. Variations of the home theme become weirder and reminiscent of the “Witches Sabbath” of Berlioz’ Symphonie Fantastique. Written just after that same World War, it is perhaps a reflection on the futility and destructiveness of the conflict. Certainly, the piece displays most of the characteristics of this versatile and approachable composer.
Ernest Chausson had the disadvantage for a composer of being born into a rich family and like Stravinsky was earmarked for a legal career but took his own course enrolling in the Paris Conservatoire where he studied with Massenet and Cesar Franck. His Poeme was a tribute to a novel by Ivan Turgenev which described an ill-fated love triangle. The work certainly emphasised the sadness of the book and never ventured into a major key. The violinist Natsuko Yoshimoto was able to express this tragic nature with marked expressionism, mostly in the lower registers. Natsuko has appeared as soloist in London, Tokyo and Hong Kong as well as with many chamber music groups at home and abroad. She plays an eighteenth century Guadagnini violin.
The excellent hand-picked orchestra was energetically led by Fabian Russell who has directed most of the principal Australian orchestras as well as the Youth Orchestra. Though breathless at the finish, he explained how the Project was born, consisting of voluntary musicians making it the “cheapest orchestra in the world“. Perhaps it’s also the best!
