6.
The background of this style is complicated. Its roots go far back into the past of Russian music. In the first of the known collections of folksongs (eighteenth-century), the gusli player Trutovsky98 already presented initial examples of the deformation and the commingling of folksong genres with the urban lyrical romance. He detected considerable influences from Italian and French music on the Russian even then. This influence had an impact on popular musical practice. At the same time they appeared in urban life and the lyrical song-romance received independent development—spreading further and further—parallel to the forms of Russian music that had emerged on the basis of folklore. Finally, in Glinka’s era, this style of romance became the primary basis of musical creativity. After Glinka it declined steadily, surviving exclusively in the sphere of urban musical practice and the salon. By then, the Gypsy current had attached itself. The apex of the Petersburg-Muscovite romance style is associated with the era of the Russian Empire. After that it became increasingly vulgarized and, at the same time, infiltrated common practice. It became the main musical expression of the urban petty bourgeoisie, analogous to the “vulgar” forms of pseudo-folksongs we are familiar with in the big cities of Europe.
This style is a piquant fusion of elements of the Western (primarily Italo-French) lyrical song, occasionally the German pseudo-classical, with Gypsy and Russian folklore. After Glinka, it passed to Dargomyzhsky, who exhibited it in Rusalka but then turned away from it in The Stone Guest, the work in which the development of music drama began in Russia. Thereafter, only Tchaikovsky drew upon this source. After him, this style fell out of use by Russian musicians. Having been abandoned in music, by the middle of the nineteenth century the essence of the lyrical romance withdrew into Russian poetry. Such a remarkable poet as Apollon Grigoryev99 was wholly nurtured by it. In our time, Alexander Blok was a brilliant exponent of the same essence of the romance. But in music this style was forgotten. Stravinsky recalled it and created Mavra.
The main tendency of Mavra is its naked candor, in a system of musical ideas that verge at times toward the simplistic. This is what constitutes Mavra’s paradoxicality.
Blossoming from those wellsprings of Russian musical life where Russian music was essentially the refined culture of dilettantes, where no trace of professional musical art as we understand it yet existed, for all its magnificent formal mastery and technical polish Mavra sparkles through and through with this dilettantism and near ineptitude. In my opinion, this is where its delicate charm and the magic of its appeal reside. At times you do not know whether it is soulful lyricism or an ironic mask. But the whole point of Mavra is that you accept it as an entirely unaffected work, you believe in the absolute sincerity of its lyrical pathos. No devotee of this type of work can relegate it to the level of ordinary aesthetic stylization.
In Mavra Stravinsky furnished an experience almost outside professional art. Striving for an expression of the utmost truth and simplicity, Mavra tries not to be professional music at all if, for the purpose stated here, that makes banishment from the professional experience of modernity inevitable. It’s a different matter that, having departed from current practice, Mavra creates a new practice—its own—powerfully and persuasively, although this is not yet evident to many. Will it be the victor? Can it replace current moribund operatic traditions? Or will it be an isolated episode? This is a question for the future that concerns not only Mavra, but also to all of Stravinsky’s creative work at the present time.
Paris, May 1927
—Translated from the Russian by Laurel E. Fay
NOTES
1. Stravinsky performed Mavra with the singers Stefan Belina-Skupevsky, Oda Slobodskaya, Yelena Sadoven, and Zoya Rozovskaya on the second half of a concert program of “Russian Music Outside of the Mighty Five” that Diaghilev had organized to entertain the press and distinguished guests invited to his gala buffet. On the first half of the program, Diaghilev’s rehearsal pianist Nikolay Kopeykin accompanied the singers in music by Glinka (“The Lark” arranged for piano by Balakirev; two arias from Ruslan and Lyudmila; and the Act 3 quartet from A Life for the Tsar), and by Dargomyzhsky and Tchaikovsky (including a chanson from Snegurochka). Ernst Ansermet then introduced Mavra, which Stravinsky performed at the piano—“with what vehemence!”—as André Rigaud remarked. Gregor Fitelberg conducted and Kopeykin and a “Mademoiselle Krieger” provided a third hand on the piano to manage difficult passages. See André Rigaud, “Une soirée chez M. de Diaghilev: ‘Mavra’ de M. Stravinsky,” Comoedia, 31 May 1922, in which Rigaud also lists the distinguished guests who attended this gala. See also Richard Taruskin, Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions: A Biography of the Works through Mavra (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), 2:1591–92
2. Gregor Fitelberg conducted a brass ensemble, Bronislava Nijinska provided stage directions, and Léopold Survage completed the Cubist sets for the premiere. The cast included the very same singers who had performed at Diaghilev’s gala buffet weeks earlier. See the official program of the Ballets russes à l’Opéra: Mai–Juin 1922, available online as part of Gallica, the digital library of the Bibliothèque nationale française, http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8415093j.r=mavra+programme.langEN.
3. See Théodore Stravinsky, Le Message d’Igor Stravinsky (Lausanne: Editions de l’Aire, 1980), 103–5.
4. Richard Taruskin, “Parody as Homage,” in Stravinsky’s Pulcinella: A Facsimile of the Sources and Sketches, ed. Maureen Carr (Middleton, WI: A-R Editions, 2010), 61. Taruskin argued vigorously for a reevaluation of Mavra and its importance to Stravinsky’s path as a composer in Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions, 2:1501–1603.
5. Emily Apter describes a translation zone, in reference to Guillaume Apollinaire’s 1912 poem “Zone,” as “a broad intellectual topography that is neither the property of a single nation, nor an amorphous condition associated with postnationalism, but rather a zone of critical engagement that connects the ‘l’ and the ‘n’ of transLation and transNation.” See Apter, The Translation Zone: A New Comparative Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006), 5.
6. Henri Collet coined the term “Les Six” as a counterweight to the Russian “Mighty Five” in 1920 to describe a group of young composers gathered around Erik Satie that included Georges Auric, Louis Durey, Arthur Honegger, Francis Poulenc, Darius Milhaud, and Germaine Tailleferre. See Collet, “Les cinq Russes, les six Français et M. Satie,” Comoedia, 16 January 1920.
7. They directed their anger primarily at Emile Vuillermoz’s review of Mavra, included here.
8. The Fountain of Youth.
9. Jean Cocteau, “The Comic Spirit in Modern Art: A Note on the Profound Realism of Exaggeration and Caricature,” Vanity Fair 19/1 (September 1922): 66.
10. This concert took place 26 December 1922. See Georges Auric, “La Musique: Du ‘Sacre du printemps’ à ‘Mavra,’” Les Nouvelles littéraires, 6 January 1923. Wiéner included “Paracha’s Aria” in a second all-Stravinsky concert on 7 November 1923. Ernest Ansermet was disappointed by this performance. See Stravinsky to Ansermet, 31 December 1922, and Ansermet to Stravinsky, 2 January 1923 in Correspondance Ansermet-Strawinsky (1914–1967), ed. Claude Tappolet (Geneva: Georg, 1991), 2:34–36.
11. The program included Mavra, the Concertino, Pulcinella Suite, and the Octet. See Valérie Dufour, “Paul Collaer et Igor Strawinsky: Lettres inédites au compositeur (1920–1925),” Revue belge de musicologie 56 (2002): 107–11.
12. Stravinsky, “The Genius of Tchaikovsky: Stravinsky’s Views. ‘The Sleeping Beauty,’” trans. Edwin Evans, Times (London), 18 October 1921; repr. as “The Sleeping Beauty” in Eric White, Stravinsky: The Composer and His Works (1966; 2nd ed., Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979): 573–74; translated as “La Belle au bois dormant: Lettre à Serge de Diaghilew,” Comoedia, 14 November 1921.
13. Aurora’s Wedding (in French, Le Mariage de la belle au bois dormant) was premiered 18 May 1922 at the Paris Op�
�ra. See Stravinsky, “Une lettre de Stravinsky sur Tchaikovsky,” Figaro, 18 May 1922; repr. in La Revue musicale 3/9 (July 1922): 87.
14. See Stanislas Fumet, “Quelques mots sur…l’évolution d’Igor Stravinsky,” Intransigeant, 29 June 1922; Pierre Lalo, “La Musique: Ballets Russes,” Feuilleton du Temps, 30 June 1922; and Louis Schneider, “M. Igor Strawinsky et les Ballets russes,” Revue de France 2/4 (July–August 1922): 438–39. Schneider compares Stravinsky’s public pronouncements to Victor Hugo’s manifesto for Hernani, and laments that Mavra disappointed in light of the expectations these pronouncements had raised.
15. The Mighty Five or Mighty Handful is a term commonly used to designate a group of composers who sought to produce a Russian national style, and that included Mily Balakirev, César Cui, Modest Musorgsky, Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov, and Alexander Borodin. For a thorough account of Stravinsky’s transformation in these years, see Taruskin, Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions, 2:1501–1537.
16. Stravinsky to Stefan Strasser in Kiel, 5 October 1925, microfilm 121.1, 1792, Paul Sacher Stiftung (henceforth, PSS).
17. Ernest Ansermet, “’Mavra’ de Stravinski,” Le Radio 13/654 (18 October 1935): 1. Ansermet had intended to write an article on Mavra and Tchaikovsky for La Revue musicale in 1922, but these plans never materialized. He told Stravinsky it was taking a long time for him to clarify his thoughts. See Ernest Ansermet to Stravinsky, 26 July and 10 September 1922, in Correspondance Ansermet-Strawinsky (1914–1967), 2:11 and 27–28.
18. Nikita Balieff founded The Bat (after the Viennese Die Fledermaus) in the basement of the Moscow Art Theater in 1908. After the revolution, he established his revue show as Chauve-Souris in Paris, and then toured Europe, the United States, and South Africa. See Taruskin, Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions, 2:1538–49; and White, Stravinsky: The Composer and His Works, 79.
19. Francis Picabia, “Jazz-Band,” Comoedia, 24 February 1922.
20. Boris de Schloezer, “Igor Stravinsky,” La Revue musicale 5/2, special issue on Igor Stravinsky (1 December 1923): 97–141.
21. J. D. [J. de Geynst], “Un musicien russe à Bruxelles: Un entretien avec M. Igor Stravinsky,” L’Etoile belge, 15 January 1924; repr. as “Un entretien avec Igor Strawinsky,” La Patrie Belge 6/1 (January 1924): 18–19. In this article Stravinsky again aligns himself as a Russian artist with Glinka and Tchaikovsky and praises the latter for his Franco-Russian mixture (mélange franco-russe).
22. On Vanity Fair’s elite status and importance to music, see Mary Davis, Classic Chic: Music, Fashion, and Modernism (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006), 129–33.
23. Vanity Fair highlighted Chauve-Souris as the “in” show of 1922 in numerous articles and photo spreads. See, for example, “The Fashions and Pleasures of New York,” Vanity Fair 18/2 (April 1922): 26, 28.
24. Auric described how Pierre Monteux’s concert performance of The Rite of Spring in 1914 had endeared Stravinsky to Les Six, and made him “and the other young men there get up on our chairs, with tears streaming down our cheeks, and cheer with maddest enthusiasm.” Georges Auric, “Erik Satie and the New Spirit Possessing French Music,” Vanity Fair 18/5 (July 1922): 104.
25. Simultanisme emerged as an artistic trend in France just before World War I and is also associated with the Futurists and Guillaume Apollinaire. Maurice Brillant remarks at length on Survage’s Cubist set in “Les Oeuvres et les hommes,” Le Correspondant 94/1436 (25 July 1922): 364–68; as does “R.-J.” in “Au Théâtre de l’Opéra: ‘Mavra,’” Comedia, 5 June 1922. Several of the reviews collected here were also illustrated with Cubist drawings. Cocteau’s article includes his drawing of Stravinsky’s music emerging from the piano; Laloy’s includes Picasso’s drawing of Stravinsky in a chair; and Poulenc’s has a Cubist lithograph by Roger de La Fresnaye. Tristan Tzara discusses and includes a reproduction of Robert Delauney’s portrait of Stravinsky in “What We Are Doing in Europe: Some Account of the Latest Ballets, Books, Pictures and Literary Scandals of the Continent,” Vanity Fair 19/1 (September 1922): 68, 100. Stravinsky’s friend Ernest Ansermet thought the “cubisme des Galleries La Fayette” of Survage’s sets “enchanted” Diaghilev. His reference to the famous Parisian department store Galeries Lafayette points toward his cynicism about the commercial success of Cubist art. See Ernest Ansermet to Stravinsky, 9 September 1923, in Correspondance Ansermet-Strawinsky (1914–1967), 2:68.
26. Surrealism in music defines not a style, but rather an international network of composers with common musical and intellectual interests and ties to Surrealist writers. This network included Francis Poulenc, Alejandro García Caturla, and Kurt Weill, and had one of its epicenters in Belgium around the composer André Souris and the poet-theoretician Paul Nougé and his journal Correspondance. For further insight, see Daniel Albright, Untwisting the Serpent (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2000), 244–74, 275–310; Sébastien Arfouilloux, Que la nuit tombe sur l’orchestre: Surréalisme et musique (Paris: Fayard, 2009), esp. the bibliography, 519–30; Catherine Miller, Jean Cocteau, Guillaume Apollinaire, Paul Claudel et le groupe des six: Rencontres poético-musicales autour des mélodies et des chansons (Liège: Mardaga, 2003); and Robert Wangermée, André Souris et le complexe d’Orphée: Entre surréalisme et musique sérielle (Liège: Mardaga, 1995).
27. When asked about their favorite music, Louis Aragon chose Musorgsky; Jacques Baron, Mozart; André Breton, none (aucun); Paul Éluard, Grieg; Théodore Fraenkel, “…”; Max Morise, Bach; Benjamin Péret, noise (le bruit); Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes, jazz; Jacques Rigaut, blacks (les nègres); Philippe Soupault, ragtime; and Roger Vitrac, Stravinsky. See “Quelques préférences,” Littérature 2, new series (1 April 1922): 1–4. Louis Aragon, André Breton, and Philippe Soupault early on published the lyrics to Stravinsky’s Berceuses de chat and Pribaoutki as “Berceuses de chat” and “Chansons plaisantes” in Littérature 10 (December 1919): 5–6, 7–8. The Berceuses de chat was also performed in a “surrealist” concert at the Galerie Barbazanges 8 March 1920, with musique d’ameublement, Georges Auric’s “Adieu New York,” Darius Milhaud’s “Printemps,” and Max Jacob’s play Ruffian toujours, truand jamais. See Arfouilloux, Que la nuit tombe sur l’orchestre, 133.
28. Deborah Mawer, “Jazzing a Classic: Hylton and Stravinsky at the Paris Opéra,” Twentieth-Century Music 6/2 (September 2009): 155–82.
29. Lalo, “La Musique: Ballets Russes.” See also Maurice Brillant, “Les Oeuvres et les hommes.”
30. Erik Satie, “Igor Stravinsky: A Tribute to the Great Russian Composer by an Eminent French Confrère,” Vanity Fair 19/6 (February 1923): 39; 88.
31. In his program note for the Illini Theatre Guild’s staging of Mavra for the Festival of Contemporary Arts in Lincoln Hall Theatre at the University of Illinois on 27, 28, 29 February and 1 March 1952 Stravinsky lamented that “Mavra has had comparatively few performances so far, due, partly to its extremely difficult score.” He notes that for this performance his son Soulima resolved the orchestral dilemma by transcribing the piece for two pianos (microfilm 121.1, 1825–30, PSS).
32. Hans Curjel situated Mavra within a neoclassical tradition in his program notes for the performance at the Kroll Opera in Berlin in 1928. See Hans Curjel, “Mavra,” Blätter der Staatsoper und der Städtischen Oper 8/19 (February 1928): 14.
33. Soviet critics began writing about Mavra after Ernest Ansermet performed excerpts of it in Moscow and Leningrad in spring 1928. A few years later, Arnold Alshvang denounced Mavra as “typical émigré art, lacking a future” in “Ideinïy put' Stravinskogo” (Stravinsky’s ideological path), Sovetskaya Muzïka 5 (1933): 90–100; repr. in Viktor Varunts, ed., I. F. Stravinsky: Perepiska s russkimi korrespondentami. Materialï k biografii (Moscow: Kompozitor, 2003), 3: 834–49. Boris Asasfyev gives a very detailed, thoughtful account of Mavra’s Russian roots and connection to the Russian petit bourgeoisie, as well as a theoretical analysis of the score in Kniga o Stravinskom (Leningrad: Triton, 1929); translated into Englis
h by Robert French with a preface by Robert Craft as A Book about Stravinsky (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1982), 197–222.
34. Stravinsky, unidentified typescript, microfilm 121.1,1812, PSS. I believe Stravinsky may have written this program note for the U.S. premiere of Mavra with the Philadelphia Grand Opera Company at the Philadelphia Academy of Music, 28 December 1934. Alexander Smallens conducted this performance, and Maria Kurenko performed the role of Parasha. It is also possible that Stravinsky wrote these notes for Ernest Ansermet’s performance of Mavra with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande in Geneva, 23 October 1935, or for another occasion.
35. Ernest Ansermet performed Mavra as part of the Concerts Jean Wiéner on 26 December 1922 in Paris; Stravinsky replaced Ansermet to conduct a concert version with the Concerts Pro Arte in Brussels on 14 January 1924; and Otto Klemperer conducted when Mavra was staged with the premiere of Oedipus Rex at the Kroll Opera in Berlin on 25 February 1928.
36. Emile Vuillermoz (1878–1960) was Gabriel Fauré’s composition student, a friend and champion of Ravel, and one of the most important music and dance critics in France. After Mavra, he continued to follow Stravinsky’s career and to write insightful reviews of his work. Stravinsky was so irked by this negative review that he taped it into his manuscript score of Mavra, now kept at the University of Illinois. See http://www.library.illinois.edu/rbx/archon/?p=collections/controlcard&id=985.
37. Vuillermoz is referring here to the “burden” of the weak libretto.
38. Vuillermoz’s wordplay on ragtime and vague (wave).
39. “rire et s’amuser en société”: the quotation marks indicate that Vuillermoz is referring to the French etiquette of entertaining in polite society, revealed in such books as Léo Lelièvre’s L’Art de s’amuser et de rire en société (Paris: Librairie Populaire, 1911).
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