Igor Stravinsky
Rite of Spring revolutionized modern music
Most quoted
"What is important for the lucid ordering of the work—for its crystallization—is that all the Dionysian elements which set the imagination of the artist in motion and make the life-sap rise must be properly subjugated before they intoxicate us, and must finally be made to submit to the law: Apollo demands it."
— from Poetics of Music, 1939
"For I consider that music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all, whether a feeling, an attitude, a psychological state, a natural phenomenon, etc.... Expression has never been an inherent property of music and is certainly not the aim of its existence."
— from An Autobiography (Chroniques de ma vie), 1936
"The faculty of creating is never given to us all by itself. It always goes hand in hand with the gift of observation. And the true creator may be recognized by his ability always to find about him, in the commonest and humblest thing, items worthy of note."
— from Poetics of Music, 1939
All quotes by Igor Stravinsky (372)
I am a man of my time.
The composer is a discoverer.
I believe in the beauty of simplicity.
My music is a journey.
I am a man of faith.
The artist must be free.
I have always been drawn to the exotic.
Music is a form of prayer.
I believe in the power of silence and sound.
I am a man of contradictions.
Tradition is entirely different from habit, even from an excellent habit, because habit is by definition an unconscious acquisition and tends to become mechanical, whereas tradition results from a conscious and deliberate acceptance.
The real composer's life is a life of mystery. He does not know why he is inspired, or why he suffers.
Conductors' careers are made for the most part with 'The Rite of Spring'.
I am the vessel through which Le Sacre du Printemps passed.
Soupers are the same all over the world.
The musician's only duty is to follow the instruments; they will ask him a question, and he will answer.
In order to create there must be, first of all, chaos.
The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees one's self of the chains that shackle the spirit.
A good composer does not imitate; he steals.
Why does the eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination when awake?
Contemporaries of Igor Stravinsky
Other Musics born within 50 years of Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971).