The Firebird
Igor Stravinsky
✒️1910 | ⏰ 45 minutes
Igor Stravinsky
Born: Oranienbaum, Russia, 1882 Died: New York, US, 1971
Igor Stravinsky’s unrivalled impact on the course of 20th century music began with his first ballets for Sergey Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes: The Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913). Original as these were – especially The Rite of Spring, with its uniquely complex rhythms, challenging dissonances and multilayering of lines – they also owed much to the Russian folk tradition.
With his move to Switzerland and then Paris during World War I came another ballet, Pulcinella (1920), this time marking a shift to the sharp-edged clarity of the neo-Classical style, which also characterises the Octet (1923), Piano Concerto (1924) and other works well into the 1940s.
In the eight months prior to June 1939, Stravinsky suffered the loss of his daughter, first wife and mother in turn and, with war impending, decamped to the US, where he undertook numerous conducting tours and composed the opera The Rake’s Progress (1951). In the 1950s, ever in tune with the times, Stravinsky made another compositional change, in which he embraced Arnold Schoenberg’s technique of serialism (where all twelve notes of the standard Western scale are used in a fixed order), as in the 1957 ballet Agon and the 1958 cantata Threni.
We can hear his own approach to his works in the many recordings he made, mostly as conductor but also as pianist. This, he said, allowed him ‘the opportunity to clarify and determine exactly my intentions’. Few composers have so thoroughly reinvented themselves and at several junctures. Stravinsky’s ability to achieve this points to a fertile, perceptive mind and a willingness to change path rather than rest on the laurels of his earlier successes.
What is the story?
Igor Stravinsky was 27 and had only a handful of orchestral pieces to his name when the impresario Sergey Diaghilev asked him to write the music for The Firebird. Diaghilev had in mind a Russianthemed spectacle as part of his company’s second season in 1910, which again took place in Paris. Both the dancers and musicians were bewildered by the score, though its novelty and complexity were nothing compared to the two further Russian-themed ballets Stravinsky would compose for Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes company – Petrushka (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913).
An original talent was clearly on the rise. ‘Mark him well’, Diaghilev told his dancers during rehearsals, ‘he is a man on the eve of celebrity’. After the premiere, Debussy invited Stravinsky to dinner, and soon the younger composer had fallen in with Paris’ leading writers, artists and patrons.
Why is this piece so iconic?
The role of music in conveying the stories and moods of ballet had, in the last quarter of the 19th century, been elevated by Tchaikovsky with Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker, but his models were largely rooted in European traditions. Diaghilev’s aim was to create a work that was inherently Russian. In The Firebird, this went not only for the traditional fairy tale but also the choreography, designs and music. ‘I need a ballet, and a Russian one’, he declared, ‘the first Russian ballet, for there is no such thing as yet'.
With his music for The Firebird, Stravinsky at a stroke revealed extraordinary promise. While still bearing the imprint of his teacher Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and others, Stravinsky displayed a remarkable technical grip, as well as an instinctive feel for fantasy and for the theatre. The Firebird was an overnight sensation, and its success may well have contributed to Stravinsky’s decision to remain in Europe rather than return to Russia.
What is the music like?
The story takes place in the enchanted garden of the evil sorcerer Kashchey. Prince Ivan happens upon the dazzling Firebird, whom he chases and captures. In return for her freedom, she gives him a magic feather that will help him in his time of need. Thirteen princesses, abducted by Kashchey, emerge to play in the garden, led by the most beautiful one, with whom Ivan falls in love. When Kashchey’s monsters capture him, Ivan summons the Firebird, who compels them into an infernal dance before lulling them to sleep. Ivan discovers the egg that holds Kashchey’s immortality and destroys it, freeing the princesses and the petrified knights. There is general rejoicing as a new, liberated kingdom is born.
Stravinsky’s music owes a debt to his predecessors Rimsky-Korsakov and Mikhail Glinka. However, the range of moods and orchestral textures is scintillating, whether in the chilling mystery of the garden, the alluring exoticism of the Firebird, the playful dance of the princesses, the grotesque dance of Kashchey’s monsters, the Firebird’s heartbeat-slowing lullaby or the closing jubilant crowd scene.
As one review of the premiere noted, ‘The music … is characterised by audacious, frenetic rhythms, by an intensely coloured orchestration whose sonorities … marvellously underline an ancient tale that is at the same time naive and savage’.
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Ryan Bancroft
Ryan Bancroft grew up in Los Angeles listening to pop, jazz, rock and rap, but studied the trumpet and other instruments in California. After switching to conducting, he continued his studies at the Royal Conservatoire of Music in Scotland and then in Amsterdam. In 2020, he became Principal Conductor of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and in 2023 he also took up the role of Chief Conductor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra. Elsewhere, he has appeared with the leading orchestras of Boston, Los Angeles, Cleveland and Tokyo, as well as in Italy, Spain and Scandinavia. He made his debut with the LSO this summer at the BBC Proms, conducting our wind, brass and percussion when he stepped in for Sir Simon Rattle.
A grounded communicator with a collaborative approach to music-making, he conducts without a baton. ‘The day that I stopped using it,’ he says, ‘all of a sudden I felt more connected to the music … I felt like a 'conductor' with a baton. I think it’s better to feel like a good musician.
The London Symphony Orchestra
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On Stage
Leader
Andrej Power
First Violins
Sini Simonen
Clare Duckworth
Ginette Decuyper
Laura Dixon
Maxine Kwok
Stefano Mengoli
Claire Parfitt
Elizabeth Pigram
Laurent Quénelle
Harriet Rayfield
Sylvain Vasseur
Morane Cohen-Lamberger Dmitry Khakhamov
Grace Lee
Hilary Jane Parker
Second Violins
Julián Gil Rodríguez
Sarah Quinn
Miya Väisänen
Helena Buckie
Matthew Gardner
Naoko Keatley
Alix Lagasse
Belinda McFarlane
Csilla Pogány
Andrew Pollock
Louise Shackelton
Juan Gonzalez Hernandez
Greta Mutlu
Jan Regulski
Violas
Natalie Loughran
Malcolm Johnston
Anna Bastow
Steve Doman
Thomas Beer
Julia O'Riordan
Robert Turner
Mizuho Ueyama
Lukas Bowen
Fiona Dalgliesh
May Dolan
Stephanie Edmundson
Cellos
Tim Gill
Laure Le Dantec
Alastair Blayden
Salvador Bolón
Daniel Gardner
Amanda Truelove Danushka Edirisinghe
Morwenna Del Mar
Young In Na
Joanna Twaddle
Double Basses
David Stark
Patrick Laurence
Thomas Goodman
Jani Pensola
Ben Griffiths
William Puhr
Lars Radloff
Adam Wynter
Flutes
Gareth Davies
Imogen Royce
Piccolo
Patricia Moynihan
Rebecca Larsen
Oboes
Olivier Stankiewicz
Ruth Contractor
Maxwell Spiers
Cor Anglais
Henry Clay
Clarinets
Sérgio Pires
Chi-Yu Mo
Bethany Crouch
Bass Clarinet
Ferran Garcerà Perelló
Bassoons
Daniel Jemison
Joost Bosdijk
Contrabassoons
Martin Field
Michael Elderkin
Horns
Diego Incertis Sánchez
Angela Barnes
Sarah Pennington
Jason Koczur
Elise Campbell
Timothy Jones
Daniel Curzon
Trumpets
Adrian Martinez
Richard Blake
Katie Smith
Niall Keatley
Aaron Akugbo
Benjamin Jarvis
Trombones
Dudley Bright
Jonathan Hollick
Bass Trombone
Paul Milner
Tuba
Ilkka Marttila
Timpani
Nigel Thomas
Percussion
Neil Percy
David Jackson
Christopher Thomas
Matthew Farthing
Benedict Hoffnung
Rachel Gledhill
Harps
Bryn Lewis
Lucy Wakeford
Susan Blair
Piano
Elizabeth Burley
Celeste
Catherine Edwards
Programme Notes Edward Bhesania is a music journalist and editor who writes for The Stage, The Strad and the Guildhall School of Music & Drama.
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