•

Igor Stravinsky lived almost 90 years (1882-1971)

•

wrote a large amount of music

•

although it changes over time, there is much we can say about what his music sounds like in general

•

1. appearance of melodies that sound like folk melodies but are different in kind than the folk melodies that we usually recognize in the Anglo-American tradition

•

characteristic of the Rite of Spring as well as the rest of his music

•

they don't come to a nice end the way we think they would

•

they sound like music that would be familiar to some group of people somewhere

•

have internal repetition

•

but the repetition is hardly ever literal

•

the scales used are not the (common( scales used in music of his time and tradition

•

it's music that sounds like it might be music to some other culture

•

he scatters these melodies throughout the score of the Rite of Spring

•

puts us in another cultural and chronological place

•

this is a particular characteristic of the Rite of Spring but certainly not limited to this piece

•

2. uncanny way of discovering new sounds

•

he does this perhaps by simply throwing his hands on the piano to see what he finds

•

they are sounds that have few other characteristics in common other than they just happen to fit under the hands on the piano

•

chords played which are just barely reachable by the thumbs

•

it's an unusual way of playing chords

•

the emphasis on the middle note of the chord is going to be important in the Symphony of Psalms piece

•

his ballet Petrushka

•

Petrushka is a puppet so you have these sounds of a puppet

•

puts two chords together and alternates them

•

Beethoven does it, but Stravinsky is a master at this

•

the first dance in the Rite of Spring

•

done to a single chord that is repeated many times

•

the only thing that varies is the accent pattern

•

it's easy to play

•

generating the maximum amount of disonance with the smallest number of notes

•

the animated dance

•

it all can be played on the piano