Foundations

Two Characters in the Cast: Serge Diaghilev and Igor Stravinsky

The first in a series of articles tracing the historic convergence of people and ideas that culminated in the cataclysmic 1913 premiere of Le Sacre du Printemps, and exploring the impact of that revolution today.
 

Circles

When you think about it, circles of all kinds are fascinating things; and no form is more fascinating than a circle of people. All the things that make a circle what it is – its perpetual line, its points forming a whole rather than separate angles, its inherent energy – can produce amazing things among a circle of creative minds.

Special, important circles of people have come together in certain times and places, collaborating and inspiring each other, sharing innovations and experiments, communing in the bliss of art and the exhilaration of forward movement in ways that transcended their lifetimes. Think of Les Six, the young Montparnasse avant-garde composers circa 1920; The Group Theatre of the early 1930s who pioneered new ideas in dramatic technique and production; The Algonquin Round Table, a group of brilliant writers in the 1920s who lunched at the New York hotel referenced by their name.

How I’ve envied them, especially in my youth! I can’t tell you how many times I sat with fellow musicians, dancers, writers and teachers, eating pizza or drinking wine, and wondered to myself wistfully, “Could this become my Circle?” But alas – in most cases, the outcome would have been on a par with Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland characters exclaiming, “Hey, I know -- let’s put on a show!”

We all have our valued communities (families, schools, studios, groups), our invaluable collaborators, and the cherished few who’ve uniquely taught and inspired us. But those historic, brilliant circles are something else again. They taught and inspired each other in that immediate goes around/comes around energy, and created things that influenced generations to come.

This begins a series of articles on one special circle, although a much looser one than those I've mentioned. In fact, they probably never considered themselves a circle -- and yet their lives overlapped and converged in unexpected, consequential ways. Discovering their connections in undergraduate research was like uncovering a soap opera, with some of my favorite characters combined in one cast. (“Those two knew each other?” “I can’t believe he said that!” “They were lovers?!!”)

As they taught, learned, wrote, produced, composed, danced, and choreographed, they inspired and frustrated each other; they agreed and disagreed with each other. They collaborated and influenced each other, ignored and promoted each other. Some of the players never even met, but they were aware of each other through shared acquaintances, performances, writings, and compositions – and they expressed their opinions.

This is a circle that never sat down together at a round table, and yet they intersected at an important point in the history of performing arts. Moreover, their peculiar collision personifies other collisions -- within European society, among art forms, and between old traditions and new ideas. I believe the culmination of their accidental circle occurred in 1913, and represented a revolution in western arts – especially the music-dance connection – that led to ripples of influence that have continued for decades.

Here, then, is a cursory introduction to two of the key characters -- Serge Diaghilev and Igor Stravinsky -- up to the point that they met. More of the story (including Jaques-Dalcroze's part in it) will follow in future articles.
 

Sergei Diaghilev: The Impresario
    (...who went from low expectations to massive influence.)

In a letter to his stepmother, the young Diaghilev described himself this way:

“I am first a great charlatan, though with brio; secondly a great charmeur; thirdly, I have any amount of cheek; fourthly, I am a man with a great quantity of logic, but with very few principles; fifthly, I think I have no real gifts. All the same, I think I have just found my true vocation – being a Maecenas.”1

Maecenas was a Roman philanthropist who supported poets, and whose name has become synonymous with “patron of the arts” in many languages. Diaghilev grew to be more than a mere patron, but a visionary producer, a team-builder, an igniter of sparks that fired brilliant new works.

Born in 1872 to a wealthy Russian family who valued the arts, Diaghilev decided to pursue a law degree in St. Petersburg. So he moved in with his cousin, Dima Filosofov. As it happened, cousin Dima was part of his own “circle,” which included aspiring artists – and not just the “I live with my mother but I’m going to make it someday” variety. These were ambitious, talented people including Leon Bakst, Alexander Benois, and “Valetchka” Fedorovitch Nouvel.

These sophisticates summed up Diaghilev as a naive dilettante, unaccomplished and untalented (all probably true). Moreover, they scoffed as his artistic opinions – he was indifferent toward their musical idol, Tchiakovsky; he didn’t like Wagner; and he even expressed disdain for ballet -- blasphemous in that time and place!

Nevertheless, young Sergei decided that he, too, had artistic leanings. So he set out to find one. First, he decided music was his "thing." He frequented concerts, he took singing lessons, and he even tried his hand at composing. Alas, his career as a composer began and ended with his original setting of the fountain scene from Boris Gudonov, an effort ridiculed by Rimsky-Korsakov, naturally echoed by Dima’s group of friends. Wish we could see those scenes from Dima's apartment in today's "reality TV" mode. ("So what was IN that fountain, Sergei?" "You better keep your day job -- oh right, you don't have one!" "Is law school looking any better now?")

Paintings became his next pursuit. He didn't have to paint as Dima's crowd did -- he only had to collect, and apparently he could afford it. He traveled Europe to gain insight; he developed a keen eye; he started a collection; and he published two articles of art criticism. Finally, Dima’s group gave him some respect.

This is what he did well -- evaluating, discussing, and presenting the talents of others -- and soon he was organizing exhibits. A new magazine launched in 1898, The World of Art, dedicated to new national trends in art, theatre, music, and literature. Diaghilev contributed to it, as did most of Dima’s group of artist-friends. When Diaghilev became its editor, he had respect at last! (We can only imagine... "Hey Sergei -- you remember me right? I always knew you were brilliant.")

The next year, Prince Sergei Wolkonsky came on the scene, appointed director of the Imperial Theatres. (Note his name, because he'll reappear later in connection with Jaques-Dalcroze.) He agreed with the novel ideas expressed in The World of Art, and engaged several of its contributing artists to design new productions. He appointed Diaghilev to a special position of various responsibilities including editing the Imperial Theatre’s annual.

That didn't work out so well. Many of the permanent employees of the theatres criticized Diaghilev for his arrogance, his lack of tact, and above all, his homosexuality. When Wolkonsky appointed Diaghilev to supervise the production of Delibes’ ballet Sylvia, the permanent officials protested. The prince backed down and withdrew his promise to Diaghilev, which in turn sparked heated argument – artists, employees, and bureaucratic officials divided on each side of the decision. Diaghilev resigned as editor of the annual, and eventually was dismissed altogether.

He went back to producing art exhibits, and found success in taking Russian art to other countries. That led him to begin exporting music as well. He began by organizing a concert for the Palais de Champs-Elysees in Paris. That success was followed by a series of Russian concerts in 1907 at the Paris Opera, with Glazunov, Rachmaninov, and Rimsky-Korsakov present to conduct their own works.

Hmm... Rimsky-Korsakov? Maybe he forgave and/or "forgot" Diaghilev’s early disastrous attempt at composing the fountain scene from Boris Godunov. Yet maybe Diaghilev himself never quite got over it. In 1908, when Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov was presented, Diaghilev interjected himself to insist on revisions, including alterations in the order of scenes, some re-orchestration, and even a few cuts! (Mere coincidence? A passive-aggressive message to Rimsky-Korsakov? An assertion of superiority over Mussorgsky? Or least likely, a sudden surge of confidence as a composer? We may never know!)

Then one of Dima's group of artists, Benois, made a suggestion to Diaghilev that changed everything. Why not include ballet in the programming for the 1909 Paris season? After all, as Benois explained, ballet had nearly died out in the west, so it would be a novelty to the audiences; and Russia still had a wealth of talented dancers and choreographers. (Benois was particularly impressed with Michael Fokine, with whom he’d collaborated in the Imperial Theatres’ 1907 production of Le Pavillon d’Armide.) Despite his previous sentiments about ballet (and Tchiakovsky), Diaghilev decided to give it a try.

That same year, he attended a Siloti concert where he heard two works that impressed him deeply: Scherzo Fantastique and Feu d’Artifice. Thus were sown the seeds of his long and legendary partnership with Igor Stravinsky.
 

Igor Stravinsky: The composer
    (...who wrote for modern dance before there was a modern dance.)

Stravinsky wrote in his autobiography:

“The presentation of the Scherzo Fantastique and the Feu d’Artifice at the Siloti concerts in the winter marks a date of importance for the whole future of my musical career. It was at that point that I began the close relationship with Diaghileff which lasted for twenty years, right up to his death.” 2

At the time of that meeting, Stravinsky was 26 years old, and by no means a famous composer. He’d known of Diaghilev through The World of Art, and perhaps through their mutual friend, Nouvel (another of Dima’s group, who helped establish the Soirees of Contemporary Music).

Stravinsky, ten years’ Diaghilev’s junior, grew up in an apartment in St. Petersburg. He began piano lessons at age nine and learned the rudiments quickly, but found his joy in improvisation.

“[O]n the one hand, it contributed to my better knowledge of the piano; and, on the other, it sowed the seed of musical ideas,” he wrote.3

(Now there's a great quote for Dalcrozians if I ever heard one!)

As a teenager, his musical mind was opened when Ivan Polkrovsky introduced him to French composers. Later he described the perspective it gave him on his own Russian training:

“That gave rise to doubts, as yet barely perceptible, with regard to what had up till then seemed unassailable dogma. That is why I am eternally grateful to Polkrovsky; for from my discussions with him dates my gradual emancipation from the influence that, all unknown to myself, the academism of the time was exercising over me.”4

After high school, ironically enough, he did exactly what Diaghilev had done ten years earlier: started studying law at the university in St. Petersburg! Like Diaghilev, he wasn’t happy with it. He persuaded his parents to let him study harmony instead -- but he wasn’t happy with those lessons either. He preferred to study counterpoint on his own.

Stravinsky met Rimsky-Korsakov’s son at the university, and through him, met the composer himself. Anxious for the great man’s opinion of his compositions, Stravinsky played a few examples of his work for him. The response wasn’t enthusiastic, but it wasn’t discouraging either; and considering the source, Stravinsky took great comfort in that. (Seems it was better than what Diaghilev got from Rimsky-Korsakov!)

As he became more involved with the Rimsky-Korsakov family, Stravinsky was led into another circle of young artists and intellectuals abreast of all the current trends in Russia. This was right at the time that The World of Art and the Soirees of Contemporary Music were established. Controversy was brewing between traditional and modern views of the arts, and Stravinsky was a bit torn -- feeling respect and gratitude for the conservative ideas and disciplined teachings of his masters, while feeling a need to build upon them toward something new.

He began studying with Rimsky-Korsakov in 1903, graduated from the university in 1905, and got married in 1906. He completed several successful works, some performed in 1908 at the Soirees. And when Rimsky-Korsakov died in 1909, he was so profoundly affected, he composed the Chant Funebre in his teacher’s memory.

He was on his own, without the guidance of a teacher. The next performance of his work brings us to the Siloti concert where Diaghilev first heard Scherzo Fantastique and Feu d’Artifice.

To be continued... (Next up: Emile Jaques-Dalcroze, of course!)