Stravinsky A Family Chronicle

As perhaps the most influential composer of the twentieth century, Igor Stravinsky lived much of his long life on the public stage. But behind that public face was a very private man, at once father and husband, and patriarch of an extended but tightly knit Russian family.This two-part chronicle is written by his eldest son Theodore, and Theodore's wife Denise. These intimate memoirs take us to the very heart of the Stravinsky family home in the years leading up to the Second World War.This new volume also contains a wealth of family photographs, revealing the composer not as the often forbidding figure of the official photographic record, but as a husband and father at play and at work in the midst of a large and vibrant family.

This, the second and final volume of Stephen Walsh’s magisterial biography of Igor Stravinsky, begins in 1934, when Stravinsky is fifty-two and living in France. Already regarded by many as the most important composer of his generation, Stravinsky is nevertheless at this point a fairly unhappy expatriate, all too aware of the war clouds beginning to gather. Though he still maintains a family life with his wife and children, much of his time is spent with his mistress, Vera Sudeykina, while traveling around Europe giving concerts in order to earn the money to support his dependents–which include a number of relatives. Composing, of course, remains the center of his existence. But changes are imminent: within only a few years his wife, Katya, will be dead, his family scattered, and Stravinsky himself, together with Vera, starting over again in America. Stravinsky: The Second Exile follows the composer through the remainder of his long life, years during which he produces such masterworks as The Rake’s Progress and Symphony in C, and achieves a new level of fame as a conductor and raconteur in his own right. With a dazzling command of sources in several languages and a keen feeling for accuracy in situations where truth and falsehood have become blurred, Walsh traces and illuminates Stravinsky’s increasingly complex and often agonized family relationships along with his crucially important connection with his associate Robert Craft. Walsh is also, as a musicologist and critic, able to speak with knowledge and wit about Stravinsky’s work, expertly describing and assessing the composer’s musical journey from the neoclassicism of his late French and early American periods, through his early essays in serial technique, and on finally to the astonishing intricacies of his final compositions. The first volume of this biography, Stravinsky: A Creative Spring, was received with glowing praise for its insight, narrative skills, and readability. The period covered here, beset as it is with myths and misconceptions, is handled with even greater authority. Carefully weighed, eloquent, packed with rich and fascinating detail, it casts a brilliant new light on one of the greatest artists of our time.

It was her love of music - especially Stravinsky's music - that drew them together. This book tells the story of the ever-changing nature of Boulanger and Stravinsky's relationship from Boulanger's perspective, tracing their interactions from 1931 to 1971. Throughout, it asks how Boulanger's professional activity during the turbulent twentieth century intersected with her efforts on behalf of Stravinsky and how this facilitated her own influential conversations with the composer about his works while also drawing her into close contact with his family.

Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971) was perhaps the twentieth century’s most celebrated composer, a leading light of modernism and a restlessly creative artist. This new entry in the Critical Lives series traces the story of Stravinsky’s life and work, setting him in the context of the turbulent times in which he lived. Born in Russia, Stravinsky spent most of his life in exile—and while his work was deliberately cosmopolitan, the pain of estrangement nonetheless left its mark on the man and his work, distinguishable in an ever-present sense of loss. Jonathan Cross shows how that work emerged over the course of decades spent in Paris, Los Angeles, and elsewhere, in an artistic circle that included Joyce, Picasso, and Proust and that culminated in Stravinsky being celebrated by both the White House and the Kremlin as one of the great artistic forces of the era. Approachable and absorbing, Cross’s biography enables us to see Stravinsky’s life and artistic achievement in a new light, understanding how his work both reflected and shaped his times.

The contemporary music scene thus embodies a uniquely broad spectrum of activity, which has grown and changed down to the present hour. With new talents emerging and different technologies developing as we move further into the 21st century, no one can predict what paths music will take next. All we can be certain of is that the inspiration and originality that make music live will continue to bring awe, delight, fascination, and beauty to the people who listen to it. This book cover modernist and postmodern concert music worldwide from the years 1888 to 2018. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Classical Music contains a chronology, an introduction, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 500 cross-referenced entries on the most important composers, musicians, methods, styles, and media in modernist and postmodern classical music worldwide, from 1888 to 2018. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about modern and contemporary classical music.

Published for the first time: a rich epistolary dialogue revealing one master teacher's power to shape the cultural canon and one great composer's desire to embed himself within historical narratives.