Rite of Spring

The 20^th century displayed many characteristics of Modernism.  Society during this time period experienced a collapse of morality and values, a loss of faith, and had a confused sense of identity and place in the world.  The drastic fluctuating thoughts of the people resulted in a chaotic and futile environment.  Similar to any other time period in history, the artists and musicians were the first to embrace the changes that were happening around them.  Igor Stravinsky, one of the most influential composers during the 20^th century, was able to recreate the struggles that society was dealing with through his music.  In Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, he demonstrates 20^th century aesthetics by tweaking the basic conventions of modernism.   

The conventions of modernism consist of fragmentation, disjunction, and stratification.  Stravinsky creatively produced the song Rite of Spring in which he displayed the society’s struggles through the three conventions of modernism.  Stravinsky embodied society’s lack of morals and values, and chaotic nature through the stratification of multiple groups of instruments. The bassoon begins the piece by playing at a very high pitch, and then an English horn joins the bassoon at the 46 second mark.  For a short while the bassoon will play and the English horn will answer and at the 1:16 mark a violin starts to play by performing pizzicato on the strings.  At the 1:20 mark of the piece more instruments join the bassoon. From this point on the piece becomes very intense.  From minute two to minute three the tempo gradually speeds up and the dynamics gradually increase as well.  During this minute, all of the instruments appear to be “playing to the beat of their own drum”.  There isn't any noticeable unison between the instruments and there is no harmony or melody.  His strategic way of layering the base and the woodwinds created a sense of disjunction between the instruments.  By layering the base and the woodwinds in this way it portrays to the audience that they are not working together, this is similar to the way that the people were acting during this time. 

Throughout part one of the Rite of Spring the pulse is kept constant while the meter is varied.  This can be seen from minute 3:00 to 3:30.  The pulse is the same but when the string instruments begin to play more vigorously and the sound becomes more intense the meter changes from when only the bassoon was playing.  The disjunction of the strings here with the peaceful bassoon portion of the song is drastic.  The inconsistency within the meter and the lack of continuity between the strings and the bassoon represents the hopelessness of society and the anger they were feelings because of their loss of self-identity.  Also, throughout the first three minutes of the song there is a distinct separation between the different parts of the ensemble.  The strings move as one, as do the woodwinds, while the brass works alone.  The sections don't complement each other, but rather take turns taking the lead or fading into the background.   

Stravinsky begins this piece with a bassoon playing by itself.  The bassoon in the Rite of Spring represents a couple of 20^th century aesthetics of modernism.  Normally, bassoons play at a lower register but Stravinsky wrote the song in a way that the bassoon had to play at an almost impossibly high register.  The uncomfortable register of the bassoon portion of this song demonstrates the fluctuating thoughts and feelings of society.  Also, Stravinsky used the convention of fragmentation in the bassoon’s solo by adding grace notes.