Le Sacre du printemps: Tableaux de la Russie païenne en deux parties, In English. The Rite of Spring: Pictures from Pagan Russia in Two Parts, is a ballet by Russian modernist composer Igor Stravinsky that premiered at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris on 29th May 1913. It is considered one of the first examples of Modernism in music and is noted for its brutality, its barbaric rhythms, and its dissonance. Its opening performance provided one of the most scandalous premieres in history, with pro and con members of the audience arguing so volubly that the dancers were unable to take their cues from the orchestra. More on that later.

The piece was commissioned by the noted impresario of the Ballets Russes, Serge Diaghilev, who earlier had produced the young composer’s The Firebird (1910) and Petrushka (1911). Stravinsky developed the story of The Rite of Spring, originally to be called The Great Sacrifice, with the aid of artist and mystic Nicholas Roerich, whose name appears with the composer’s on the title page of the earliest publications of the score. The production was choreographed by Vaslav Nijinsky, and its sets and costumes were designed by Roerich.

Like Stravinsky’s earlier works for the Ballet Russes, The Rite of Spring was inspired by Russian culture, but, unlike them, it challenged the audience with its chaotic percussive momentum.

In the mid-20th century, Stravinsky revised the orchestration for concert performance, and that version of the score remains the version that is most commonly performed. In 1987, however, the ballet as it was first conceived and performed, with original set and costumes and Nijinsky’s choreography (which had been seen for only seven performances before it was superseded by new choreography from Léonide Massine), was painstakingly reconstructed and re-created by the Joffrey Ballet. The centenary of the ballet’s premiere prompted other ballet companies, notably the Mariinsky in St. Petersburg, to also revive the work in its original form.

The Rite of Spring is divided into two parts:

I. Adoration of the Earth

• Introduction
• The Augurs of Spring: Dances of the Young Girls
• Ritual of Abduction
• Spring Rounds
• Ritual of the Rival Tribes
• Procession of the Sage
• The Sage
• Dance of the Earth

II. The Sacrifice

• Introduction
• Mystic Circles of the Young Girls
• Glorification of the Chosen One
• Evocation of the Ancestors
• Ritual Action of the Ancestors
• Sacrificial Dance (The Chosen One)

The idea for the work came to Stravinsky in 1910 when he was composing The Firebird but the composer put the project to one side for a year while writing Petrushka, his second successful score for Diaghilev. He then immersed himself in The Rite in the summer of 1911. The archaeologist and folklorist Nikolai Roerich was an integral part of the creative process, providing Stravinsky with drawings from scenes of historical rites. 

The score was written in a rented house in Clarens, Switzerland, in a tiny room with just enough space for an upright piano, a table and two chairs. Stravinsky completed the composition, two parts of roughly equal length (Adoration Of The Earth and The Sacrifice), by the beginning of 1912 and finished the instrumentation by late spring. 

Its premiere, at the Théâtre de Champs-Elysées on 29th May 1913, conducted by Pierre Monteux, caused a scandal. The work was such a violent wrench from every musical tradition that had gone before. To many people, it seemed like the work of a madman. There is no space here to illustrate the many complex technical innovations in this primordial, elemental score, but, contrary to popular belief, it was not just the shock of hearing the music, nor Nijinsky’s exotic choreography, nor Roerich’s bizarre settings that prompted the riot that ensued in the theatre. There were anti-Russian, anti-Diaghilev and anti-Nijinsky factions at work in Paris, determined to disrupt proceedings before a note of music had been heard. 

A year later, a concert performance was given in the Casino de Paris, conducted again by Monteux. This time Stravinsky was carried from the hall shoulder-high in triumph. Nothing he wrote subsequently had the same shattering impact on the musical world.

After the premiere the writer Léon Vallas opined that Stravinsky had written music 30 years ahead of its time, suitable to be heard in 1940. Coincidentally, it was in that year that Walt Disney released Fantasia, an animated feature film using music from The Rite and other classical compositions, conducted by Stokowski. The Rite segment of the film depicted the Earth’s prehistory, with the creation of life, leading to the extinction of the dinosaurs as the finale. Among those impressed by the film was Gunther Schuller, later a composer, conductor and jazz scholar. The Rite of Spring sequence, he says, overwhelmed him and determined his future career in music: “I hope [Stravinsky] appreciated that hundreds—perhaps thousands—of musicians were turned onto The Rite of Spring … through Fantasia, musicians who might otherwise never have heard the work, or at least not until many years later”

I was absolutely blown away when I heard the Rite of Spring in concert for the first time. It was as mesmerising an experience as you could ever imagine. The rhythms, the dissonances, the incredible textures, EVERYTHING just got under my skin and I knew that I had witnessed something that would change the way I listened to music completely…..and it did. It taught me to listen to everything that was going on up there on the stage and not just the first thing that entered my ears.

I have been to hear the Rite of Spring in the concert hall over 40 times and have listened to it hundreds of times on recordings. It is a masterpiece.

The recording I have picked here is a rather old recording of a performance given by The LSO under the baton of Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein’s performance is as incredible as that of his musicians. He leaps (The Lenny Leap), he grimaces, he smiles and he dances. Watch him and feel the music with him. It is a really remarkable sensation.

We have to listen to some more Stravinsky soon.