116

pitches by piccolo, flute, alto flute, harp, celesta, bells, vibraphone, and hom.
It is interesting to note that Stravinsky incorporates the pianistic device of
placing the lowest sound of a widely stretched chord, one which cannot be
reached by the hands of a pianist, before the beat as a tied grace note. It
obviously was more important to him that the piano sound all of the tones
written, even if it meant changing the rhythmic sense of the measure. (One
wonders why he did not assign the lowest notes of the chords to a second
pianist; it is highly possible that Stravinsky, ever the pragmatist, could not
justify another performer for so small a role).
Although the Requiem Canticles was a work specifically commissioned
to be dedicated to the memory of Helen Buchanan Seeger, it must be supposed
that Stravinsky also had in mind his own approaching death and that it would
be his own requiem. It is fitting and beneficial for the purposes of this
particular study that he chose to incorporate the piano into his last major
work, bringing to a close a tradition that had begun with his first major
success nearly sixty years previously.

Stravinskv*s Attitudes Regarding

Non-traditional Usage of Piano
. . . And what of the future? I shall continue to trust my taste
buds and the logic of my ear, quaint expressions which I may be
able to ampHfy by adding that I require as much hearing at the
piano as ever before. I know, too, that I will never cross the gulf
from well-tempered pitches to sound effects and noise, and never
abdicate the rule of my ears.**
This comment, made by Stravinsky to Robert Craft in the early 1960s,
is an eloquent statement of his compositional and musical philosophy of music.
Although one cannot be certain what Stravinsky is referring to as "well-
tempered pitches," I believe he was alluding to the twelve pitches of the
chromatic scale, which can be identified as the twelve different keys within an

44
Stravinsky, Themes and Conclusions, p. 33.