Igor Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" with Marc-André Hamelin & Gloria Chien

For our 2020-21 entirely virtual season, virtuoso pianists Marc-André Hamelin and Gloria Chien came together at Mechanics Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts to perform to an empty room for the purposes of Chamber Music Northwest's ability to share music while the arts world was shut down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The 30-minute recording is their performance of Igor Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring."

PROGRAM NOTES
For a moment, imagine you are a ballet dancer in France in 1912. You typically spend your days performing traditional ballets like Swan Lake and Giselle, or perhaps the latest premiere by Debussy or Ravel. But today you begin rehearsals for a new ballet by Igor Stravinsky with a mysterious-sounding name: "The Rite of Spring."

The rehearsal pianist begins playing a melody that sounds a bit like a folk song. Unusual, but not overly harsh to the ears. Suddenly, he begins slamming his hands down on the keys, seemingly at random. There are no discernible chords or melodies, and the rhythms with which the pianist assaults his instrument seem entirely random. A combination of excitement and dread fills your body: clearly, you’re in for an unusual experience.

As the rehearsal process continues, things only get stranger. Your dance moves feel more like jumping jacks than pirouettes or pliés. Your costume looks more like a potato sack than a tutu. One day, the composer shoves the rehearsal pianist off his stool, yelling that the music should be twice as fast. Your fellow dancers start complaining that rehearsals are essentially math class at this point, with all the counting involved.

By the final rehearsal–Stravinsky will later estimate that there were 130 in all–an intense feeling of anticipation surrounds the ballet. But even then, you couldn’t possibly have anticipated what was in store on May 29, 1913.

As you wait to take the stage at the Rite’s premiere, you can already hear the audience laughing over the opening bassoon melody. Soon, shouting matches emerge between those who love the ballet and those who hate it. Fist fights break out in the aisles, and all manner of projectiles fly through the air in the general direction of the stage. Through much of Part I, you can’t even hear the orchestra over the din; the choreographer tries to yell out the beat to keep your ritualistic dance moves together. Amazingly, everything holds together through the end of Part II, and Igor Stravinsky takes the stage for a curtain call–proud of the extreme reaction his ballet had provoked.

Back in the year 2020, in our virtually distanced concert hall, "The Rite of Spring" no longer provokes such an extreme reaction. Yet Stravinsky’s music continues to shock and amaze, perhaps even more so in this rarely heard version for two pianos. When performed on pianos alone, the magnificently complex rhythms and harmonies that make Stravinsky’s music so revolutionary can be heard with crystal clarity. Far from a watered-down copy of the full orchestral score, it actually represents Stravinsky’s original conception of the piece–what dancers, critics, and others in Stravinsky’s circle might have heard in private even before its fateful premiere.

–(c) Ethan Allred