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)
The phenomenon of music is given to us with the sole purpose of establishing an order in things, including, and particularly, the coordination between man and time.
The more constraints one imposes, the more one frees oneself of the chains that shackle the spirit... The arbitrariness of the constraint serves only to obtain precision of execution.
To create is to choose.
A composer is a man who organizes sounds. And if he organizes them well, he is a good composer. And if he organizes them badly, he is a bad composer.
I have always been a classicist. I am not a revolutionary.
My freedom thus consists in my moving about within the narrow frame that I have assigned myself for each one of my undertakings.
The creator's function is to discriminate, to choose, to take and to reject.
Tradition is a living force that animates and informs the present.
The true tradition is not the relic of a past that is forever gone, but a living force that animates and informs the present.
What is important for the good of art is that the artist should be a man of his time, and that he should be a man of his country.
The artist is not a creator in the sense that he invents something out of nothing. He is a discoverer.
I am against all forms of expressionism.
Music is given to us to organize what is chaotic in the world.
The composer's work is not to invent, but to discover.
I hate music that is too expressive. I like music that is just music.
The artist is a vessel for the ideas that come to him.
I am not interested in expressing myself. I am interested in expressing music.
The true artist is a craftsman.
My music is not about me. It is about music.
The function of music is to further the worship of God.
Contemporaries of Igor Stravinsky
Other Musics born within 50 years of Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971).