The Rite of Spring. Le Sacre du Printemps.

Sketches, 1911-1913 by Igor Stravinsky; Robert

Craft
Review by: William W. Austin
Notes, Second Series, Vol. 26, No. 3 (Mar., 1970), pp. 502-504
Published by: Music Library Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/896859 .
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 BOOK REVIEWS
Compiled and edited by DON M. RANDEL

The Rite of Spring.Le Sacre du Printemps.Sketches,1911-1913.By Igor

Stravinsky.Facsimile reproductionsfrom the autographs. Preface by
Francois Lesure and introductoryessay (1966) by Robert Craft.[Printed
in Nevers,France]: Boosey and Hawkes, 1969. [xlvii p.; color facsimile
of MS, 140 p.; four-partappendix in pocket of binding,48 p.; $60.00]
The Rite of Spring looms as so great a
landmark in history,and Stravinsky'scal-
ligraphylooks so handsome with its high-
lights of red and green ink and red and
blue and even yellow and purple pencil,
that this sumptuous color facsimileis well
justified. The work and its history, in-
deed, would have justified a publication
even grander and more meticulous.These
sketches in facsimile will doubtless be
studied in detail by many people, as well
as arousing and re-arousing admiration
among many more when they are dis-
played in library cases.
Stravinskyhimself participates in the
historical investigation of his famous
work. Just how much he has participated
in the present publication is not quite
clear, nor just how his interpretationof
the sketchesdepends on other documents
not yet publicly available. His own col-
lection of manuscripts, catalogued by
Robert Craft in 1954 (this catalogue pub-
lished in E. W. White's Stravinsky,1966,
Appendix C), includes a copy of the pub-
lished score (1921) with six pages "re-
written" and furthermarkingson almost
every page; an envelope containing two
sketchesfrom 1912; and a folder contain-
ing four pages of undated sketches and
scoring. Since 1962 (according to White,
p. 170) Stravinskyhas possessed also the
manuscript score that was used by the
publishers. Another manuscript belongs
to his son ThModore,and still another, a
score of the first part, dedicated to
Miaskovsky,belongs to M. Andre Meyer.
Finally, in 1967, the four-hand piano
score that Stravinskyhad marked up in
1913 for Nijinsky, recordinghis "original
plan of choreographic movement," was
bought back by the composerat a London
auction. This last document is the basis
of Appendix III in the present publica-
tion, where Stravinskyconfesses his sur-
prise at some of the details he now recalls,
"aided by the memorydrug of this score."
Both the sketchbook and the score for
Nijinsky were apparently given to Misia
Godebski Sert on the day after the
premiere performance of the ballet, in
gratitude for her patronage. A few years
later, either Stravinsky or Mme Sert
passed them on to Diaghilev; Stravinsky
wrote Diaghilev a dedication on the
sketchbook,dated October 1920; there was
a plan to auction the manuscript,which
seems never to have been carried out.
After Diaghilev died (1929) both docu-
ments were lost to the composer. Now
he knows that the sketchbookbelonged to
Boris Kochno; the score for Nijinsky be-
longed to Anton Dolin. In 1961 the sketch-
book was acquired by the collector Andre
Meyer,and in 1963 it was described in the
catalogue of Meyer's collection (Abbeville,
1961; supplement, 1963). Stravinsky'sold
friend Pierre Souvchinskybrought him to
M. Meyer to look at the book. From then
on, his memorieshave been dredged more
and more thoroughly.
Six lettersof 1910-1912 from Stravinsky
to the painter Nikolai Roerich and one of
1912 to the journalist Nikolai Findeizen
are presented in Appendix II, in Stravin-
sky's translation. They add much to the
storyof how the Rite was composed and
how the prodigious young composer felt
about it as he worked.These lettersmight
properly have been printed with Robert
Craft's essay at the front of the volume,
in French, German, and English. (The
Russian originals would have been wel-
come too.) Their relegation to the Ap-

502

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pendix suggests that publishing them at
all was an afterthought.
A fourthand final Appendix consistsof
advice to conductors of the Rite, com-
piled by Robert Craft after rehearsals of
his own performancesall over the world,
1961-67,under more or less supervisionof
Stravinsky.This little guide, according to
the table of contents, is available in
French and German, though in my copy
it appears only in English.
The firstAppendix-the only one that
needed to be printed in a separate book-
let-is Craft's twenty-five-page commen-
tary on the sketches,page by page, with
English translationsof the Russian notes,
and referencesto the published score that
will save time for any student.
Some discrepanciesturn up between the
facsimile and the Craft commentary,and
between both and Lesure's brief biblio-
graphical foreword: page 81 of the fac-
simile seems to correspond to page 83 of
the manuscript or copy that Lesure
studied; page 116 of the facsimile is
Craft's 120; page 138 is Lesure's 146 and
Craft's 142; etc. The final page of the
facsimile, 139, is a score of the last six
measures from the first of the Three
Japanese Lyrics, without the voice part,
but Lesure indicates that the manuscript
book contains 168 pages, while Craft in-
dicates that some pages originallybelong-
ing to the manuscript somehow became
detached, and he leaves me uncertain as
to whetherthe facsimilepage 117 (his 121)
may be one of these, now reassembled.
Lesure mentions the Pribaoutki and the
third Japanese lyric,which neither Craft
nor I find represented.
Lesure mentions "some first drafts
[ebauches] which were probably never
used (particularlypp. 100 and 143)," but
he seems not to have recognized the frag-
ments of the Souvenirs de mon enfance,
page 109. Could this be one of his un-
identifiedpages, or could it be one that
was detached from the rest when he
studied the manuscript, now restored in
the published facsimile,or is there some
other explanation?
Craft refers to "four measures of a
'Dieppe Polka,'" which corresponds to
nothing in White's catalogue. On page
133 of the facsimileare the four measures,
headed "For the Polka for Diep." In the
1963 catalogue this item was listed as page
503
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135. Is this conceivablyanother of Lesure's
unidentifiedpages?
More interestingto me than these dis-
crepancies is a point on which Craft hints
at a differencebetween his own opinion
and Stravinsky's: page 41, he says, is
identifiedby the composer as firstsketches
for Act II of The Nightingale, but Craft
detects a three-notemotive belonging to
the prelude to Part II of the Rite. Did
either Craft or Stravinsky,I wonder, con-
sider another motive on this page, a line
in the tenor registerthat presentswhat in
the completed Rite is divided between two
solo trumpets unaccompanied, beginning
a measure before rehearsal number 85?
This motive, in the sketch, is accom-
panied by full chords, tremolando,which
I cannot find in either the opera or the
ballet. The motive that is to emergeas the
trumpet duet, on the other hand, can be
traced through page 62, where it is juxta-
posed with the soft shuddering chords of
four measures after 86. On page 63 the
line is divided into two parts, but not yet
assigned to trumpets. Only at this stage,
when the whole complex of Part II is
brewing, does Stravinsky note that the
motive belongs "at the very beginning of
Part II," and that it makes sense unac-
companied. On pages 64-65 the version
that will lead to the rising curtain is
worked out. On page 78 the motive re-
turns, as Craft observes, in a "curious
mislocation of register,"on its way to the
passage in the Action of the Ancestors,
between 133 and 134. Most curious of all,
the motive appears on page 81, isolated
on a staff that has been drawn by five
swiftstrokesof the pencil, instead of the
wheeled staff-rulerthat Stravinskyused
throughout the book; this is crossed out
by an angry looking scribble. Just above,
on the same page, Stravinskyhas tried
combining the motive with the main
themes of the Ancestors movement and
has encircled the notes of the lower voice
of the duet. Craft says "it is evident" that
another page or two of sketches for this
passage must be missing. Were further
contrapuntal effortstorn out in a rage?
Not many pages of the book permit us
such intimate insights into the com-
poser's trial-and-errormethods. But many
pages, as Craft points out, show fascinat-
ing aspects of his procedure and suggest
quibbles that can occupy the experts for
generations to come.
Eventually, as the expert studies of all
the relevant documents accumulate, we
may hope for some better explanation
than can yet be offeredof how the Rite
all hangs together,how its parts enhance
each other. Despite the shortcomingsthat
Classical and Romantic. The Pelican Historyof Music, Vol. 3. By Hugh
Ottawayand A. J. B. Hutchings.Baltimore:Penguin Books, 1968. [251 p.;
paper $1.45]
As the completion of The Pelican His-
tory of Music, this third volume really
consists of two separate books bound
together-"The Enlightenment and the
Revolution," by Ottaway, and "The
Nineteenth Century," by Hutchings. In
other words,it completes another of those
historical series that are parceled by their
editors according to the commonly ac-
cepted eras of music. Among the best
known and most respected precedents for
such series are The Oxford History of
Music, begun at the turn of this century
and currentlyfightingits way into The
New Oxford History of Music, a third
edition projected in eleven volumes by a
much larger number of authors; Ernst
Bucken'sHandbuch der Musikwissenschaft,
thirteen tightlypacked, richly illustrated
volumes published between 1927 and 1931;
and, of course, the Norton series, started
in 1940 and still awaiting its seventh,
much delayed, much needed, Classic
volume.
Only recentlydid such series begin to
proliferate,with the tendencynow being,
however, toward more streamlining of
subject matter,more utilitarian goals, and
more particularizedslants. One of the new
series generally best realized, that of
Prentice-Hall in eleven volumes under H.
Wiley Hitchcock's over-all editorship,
seems to be aimed primarily at the one-
semesterclass in the upper undergraduate
college years or the firstyear of graduate
work. The still more abbreviated volumes
issued thus far in the (Wm. C.) Brown
Music Horizon Series seem to be aimed
more at the undergraduate music appre-
ciation layman, to judge by their syn-
thetic, second-hand, less sophisticated
contents and the lesser degrees of experi-
ence they reflect.The series from which
the volume under review comes, like that
504
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a historianmay regretin the presentpub-
lication, its sheer beauty testifiesto the
motivation that historians share with all
the performersand listenerswho help to
cultivate and celebrate the Rite as a great
centripetal forcein the world.
WILLIAM W. AUSTIN
Cornell University
other recent British series, Man and His
Music, by Harman and Mellers (4 vols.),
still aims at the cultured, inquiring
reader with more exposure to the arts in
general than to music in particular.
Romain Goldron's new History of Music
series, now being distributed by Double-
day, is in yet another category,since it
draws especially on the fascinationof pic-
torial records.
The firstvolume of The Pelican History
of Music, Ancient Forms to Polyphony
(1960), was divided into four sections by
four authors, including one by each of
the two over-all series editors, Alec
Robertson and Denis Stevens.The second
volume, Renaissance and Baroque (1963),
was divided into fivesections,one of these
being by Stevens. In the third volume,
here in question, there are only the two
divisions mentioned earlier, classic and
romantic. Hutchings' contributionon the
romantic era gets more than three-fifths
of the space (140 as against 87 pages),
including its final chapter, "The Indian
Summer,"which extends the discussion to
the time of World War II, in so far as he
saw romanticism lasting that long. In a
one-page "Conclusion" Hutchings ends
with a question that bears out his genuine
devotion to his subject: "Is music essen-
tially a romantic art? Can no musician
claim greatnessuntil he shares the appeal
to our common humanity notably
achieved by the great romantics?"A pub-
lisher's note on the inside frontcover adds
that "European Music in the Twentieth
Century, edited by Howard Hartog and
available in Pelicans in the British Com-
monwealth, forms a sequel to this final
volume of the Pelican History of Music."
Ottaway organizes his treatmentof the
classical era sensibly and simply with
chapters on "Music and Society in the