DLXXVI. STRAVINSKY, Igor: Octet

DLXXVI. STRAVINSKY, Igor (1882-1971)

Octet (1923)
1. Sinfonia (Lento -- Allegro moderato)
2. Tema con variazioni (Andantino)
3. Finale (Sempre 1/4-note=116, Tempo giusto)
"The President's Own" United States Marine Band
(16:10)

Abandoning the "neo-primitivist" Russian style of the big ballets of the Nineteen-teens, this work firmly belongs in the new "neo-classic" period which was to occupy Stravinsky for the rest of his life.

The critics thought it a "bad joke of 18th-century mannerisms." It was also uncomfortably "dissonant."

A century later, we can simply declare it as a masterpiece of unusually-scored chamber music -- flute, clarinet, two bassoons, two trumpets and two trombones.

First movement

The opening Lento contains the melodic and harmonic seeds of what's to follow:

Allegro moderato; the main theme:

Second movement

In a letter Ernest Ansermet, Stravinsky wrote that Mozart was for him what Ingres was to Picasso.

Hmm; a comparison is in order:

Ingres: Grande Baigneuse (1808)

Picasso: Portrait of Gertrude Stein (1906)

The theme is presented by the high winds, then the second trumpet:

The following variation ("Variation A") is used as an introduction to the second, fourth and seventh variations. Stravinsky referred to it as the "ribbon of scales." It is spectacular music:

a march:

(Variation A)

a waltz:

(Variation A)

a can-can

(Variation A)

A solemn fugue in 5/8:

Third movement

The Russian circle-dance (khorovod) made previous appearances in The Firebird and Le Sacre ... here its 3+3+2 rhythm is gradually insinuated:

and made explicit here:

We see it again in the trumpet just bars before the end: