Stravinsky's Piano: Genesis of a Musical Language

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Introduction
1. Becoming a Russian musician
2. Becoming a neoclassicist
3. Stravinsky's piano workshop
4. Departures and homecomings
Conclusions.

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Stravinsky's reinvention in the early 1920s, as both neoclassical composer and concert-pianist, is here placed at the centre of a fundamental reconsideration of his whole output - viewed from the unprecedented perspective of his relationship with the piano. Graham Griffiths assesses Stravinsky's musical upbringing in St Petersburg with emphasis on his education at the hands of two extraordinary teachers whom he later either ignored or denounced: Leokadiya Kashperova, for piano and Rimsky-Korsakov, for instrumentation. Their message, Griffiths argues, enabled Stravinsky to formulate from that intensely Russian experience an internationalist brand of neoclassicism founded upon the premises of objectivity and craft. Drawing directly on the composer's manuscripts, Griffiths addresses Stravinsky's lifelong fascination with counterpoint and with pianism's constructive processes. Stravinsky's Piano presents both of these as recurring features of the compositional attitudes that Stravinsky consistently applied to his works, whether Russian, neoclassical or serial, and regardless of idiom and genre.

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This is a well-written, engaging book that delves into technical discussion of compositional processes while remaining eminently readable ... Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates, graduate students, faculty, and professionals

Music and Letters

an eloquently written monograph that traces the influence of Stravinsky's pianism on his compositional process ... Stravinsky's Piano is a resounding success that will be celebrated by the Stravinsky community for years to come

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