Homage to Stravinsky

My son asked for ginger-pear waffles today, but I discovered that my waffle maker had died, and quickly improvised ginger-pear pancakes instead, which we ate on a fish plate (!) with blackberries.

I always say that if my life were to have a soundtrack, it would be with music by Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971). Classical for sure yet refreshingly modern, all the grand feelings are crammed into his music: From absolute joy (Ragtime for Eleven Instruments) to the deepest fear (Rite of Spring). In Stravinsky, there’s also music that depicts those, rather frequent, times in life when you wonder what on Earth is really going on (Movement for Piano and Orchestra).

When I grew up, we had two classical vinyl records in our home. One came in a soft lilac cover with a romantic image of a misty lake in the middle and featured Tchaikovsky’s ballet music: Swan Lake and The Nutcracker. The other came in a cover that dramatically showcased a woman’s face surrounded by golden autumn leaves, and with music by Chopin. I can’t remember my parents ever listening to either one of these records. However, I did. The Chopin album became my entryway to classical music. This music was highly charged and very emotional. When I was alone, I would improvise a dance to it, waiting for the “Heroic” Polonaise, which was overwhelming and dramatic. Sometimes I cried. It felt good to cry to Chopin’s “Heroic”.

For a long time, Chopin and Tchaikovsky was all I knew about classical music, until a high school friend introduced me to The Rite of Spring and Stravinsky. It was a revelation! I had never heard anything like it; it was daring and strange and full of bizarre sounds. Unconventional and exciting. Soon after this introduction, I bought my first classical music record: The Rite of Spring and Petrushka by Stravinsky conducted by Seiji Ozawa. I seem to recall an orangey cover, although by that time I was obviously more interested in the music than the album cover.

Via Stravinsky I segued into other areas of classical music. I would listen to a little bit here and a little bit there. I got to know the drama of Beethoven’s Great Fugue and Bach’s Double Violin Concerto, which seemed as crisp as a newly laundered and ironed white shirt. I remember hearing the twinkling exquisite beauty of Debussy’s Syrinx for Unaccompanied Flute for the first time, and Gershwin’s energetic Cuban Overture, but I always come back to Stravinsky. He’s easy to love, because he has something that I think many of the other classical composers lack and that is humor.

“My music is best understood by children and animals,” Stravinsky once said. And what could possibly be better than that? He also said “Music praises God”. I’m sure all art can be said to praise God, but I wonder what art form so quickly puts us in what feels like instant contact with a higher power, as music.

Sometimes I think I’m lucky to come from a home where no classical music was played, because it meant I was left alone to discover it for myself, and without judgment. Nobody told me that I had to “understand” classical music, or that this particular classical piece was good and that not so good. It was up to me to decide whether I preferred Gershwin or Mozart (and I prefer Gershwin). Nobody cared.

It makes me sad that so many people seem to believe classical music needs to be “understood” or that it’s boring. Once, I asked a friend to take care of my son while I went to a concert at Carnegie Hall. Afterwards, as I picked him up, my friend’s husband blushed and said that unfortunately they didn’t know much about classical music. Well, neither do I. What is there to know anyway? All you need to do is listen and today it’s easier than ever to listen to music, there is such a multitude of venues. You can listen to so much and often almost for free too. If you’re new to classical music, I hope that what I’ve written here can act as a testament to the fact that you don’t need to know anything at all about classical music in order to enjoy it. Just listen and say either “I like this” or “I don’t like that”, you don’t have to say why. You decide what you think is good. You be the judge.

Igor Stravinsky, my all-time favorite composer, in a drawing by my son.