# What If?



## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Interesting to think about the circumstances of the collaboration between Stravinsky and Diaghilev, and its far reaching musical implications. For one thing Stravinsky's teacher was Rimsky-Korsakov, a man who despised ballet and discouraged his students from composing it. Rimsky-Korsakov died unexpectedly in 1908 one year before the Diaghilev commission. Had he been alive in 1909, Stravinsky would almost certainly not have composed a ballet. Secondly, Diaghilev's idea to create a "Russian" sounding ballet was an unprecedented idea. The Russians thought of ballet as essentially a French import, and the thought of exporting it back to France in a Russian style is something that Russian composers might find regressive.

Indeed, Diaghilev first approached Anatoli Liadov with the idea and was turned down, he was also rejected by Glazunov, Tcherepnin, and Nikolai Sokolov. It appears Diaghilev simply went down a list he had of composers he had commissioned some Chopin orchestrations from earlier in 1909, and (the largely unknown at the time) Stravinsky was near the bottom of that list. Had any of the other composers taken that commission, Stravinsky would not have composed _The Firebird_, and possibly never gone to Paris.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Is the question, "What would have become of Stravinsky had he not met Diaghilev?"


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## Prodromides (Mar 18, 2012)

tdc said:


> Had he been alive in 1909, Stravinsky would almost certainly not have composed a ballet.


Are you saying Rimsky-Korsakov would prevent young composers from writing music for ballet?
Igor was already into his late 20s in 1908/'09 - an adult should be able to choose whether or not to compose ballet.


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## Forster (Apr 22, 2021)

tdc said:


> Rimsky-Korsakov died unexpectedly in 1908 one year before the Diaghilev commission. Had [RK] been alive in 1909, Stravinsky would almost certainly not have composed a ballet.


Almost certainly? Perhaps not in 1909, but surely IS's determination and iconoclasm would have seen him eventually defy his teacher. ("Now I am the master!")


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Woodduck said:


> Is the question, "What would have become of Stravinsky had he not met Diaghilev?"


It can be, yes. Any thoughts the topic stimulates are welcome.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Prodromides said:


> Are you saying Rimsky-Korsakov would prevent young composers from writing music for ballet?
> Igor was already into his late 20s in 1908/'09 - an adult should be able to choose whether or not to compose ballet.





Forster said:


> Almost certainly? Perhaps not in 1909, but surely IS's determination and iconoclasm would have seen him eventually defy his teacher. ("Now I am the master!")


Well, perhaps you two are right? I'm not sure, I'm pretty much reiterating some of the things that came up in the Taruskin essay I read earlier.


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Forster said:


> Almost certainly? Perhaps not in 1909, but surely IS's determination and iconoclasm would have seen him eventually defy his teacher. ("Now I am the master!")





Prodromides said:


> Are you saying Rimsky-Korsakov would prevent young composers from writing music for ballet?
> Igor was already into his late 20s in 1908/'09 - an adult should be able to choose whether or not to compose ballet.


I thought of something else though. It might not have been a matter of anyone forcing Stravinsky not to do anything, but more so a matter of Stravinsky getting certain other opportunities while under the guidance of Rimsky-Korsakov. But with his teacher gone he may have considered his opportunities more limited and was therefore more likely to try something he may have previously passed on.


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## Forster (Apr 22, 2021)

History seems to me as much about opportunity as it is about inevitability, so you may be right. Speaking personally, I guess I took the path through life that was more to do with what presented itself at the time than any single-minded determination I had to follow a particular route. I'm not wishing to generalise from that, but I have come across other people, in my life, and in the news, who did what they did simply because of what was available at a critical moment in their life. Having said that, we can probably all think of a time when we had a choice of opportunities.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Woodduck said:


> Is the question, "What would have become of Stravinsky had he not met Diaghilev?"


Maybe the question is: What music would we have from Stravinsky had his parents never met?


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## JTS (Sep 26, 2021)

What if Mozart’s father hadn’t have been a violin padagogue?


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

SONNET CLV said:


> Maybe the question is: What music would we have from Stravinsky had his parents never met?


No, not this. You can start your own thread for that if you want, good luck to you. I also prefer _ideas_ to be discussed, related to music. Maybe start a thread for your jokes in the community forum?


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

JTS said:


> What if Mozart's father hadn't have been a violin padagogue?


As the saying goes it takes hard work, talent and sometimes certain circumstances for an artist to succeed. Interesting anecdotes of this nature are welcome. But maybe try to not get too broad with this.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

SONNET CLV said:


> Maybe the question is: What music would we have from Stravinsky had his parents never met?


We'd have had the sound of one hand clapping. (Sorry, tdc. He had it coming. :angel


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

JTS said:


> What if Mozart's father hadn't have been a violin padagogue?


Nobody knows. But former times were not as terrible at finding talent in unlikely places than we might expect. Haydn was from a very modest background but discovered as a boy singer. In other fields Kant and Gauss came from lower class/artisan backgrounds and were discovered as gifted children. It's not at all unlikely that someone with Mozart's talent who was the son of a Salzburg baker or lawyer would have been discovered already as a child or teen and provided with a musical education.

As for the original question. The "exotism" of Rimsky had been quite common in the late 19th century and the interest in "real" ethnic music was also a widespread phenomenon. Cf. Debussy and Gamelan, Bartok, RVW or already Grieg collecting music from rural backwaters.
So we might have an alternative Firebird by Rimsky and we might not have the other early Stravinsky ballets either but he could still have developed in roughly similar ways with a few years delay. Or maybe not. When I first read "War and Peace" in my early 20s I was quite irritated and provoked by the "Great men don't matter" thesis (but rather long term historical forces or accidents*) because I had been fed the "Great men and momentous events" thesis since reading Ladybug and similar books with popular history in primary school. Now I (boringly) think that the truth is probably in the middle. Stravinsky was a genius and Le Sacre was a momentous event in the history of music but many things would have developed not entirely differently without them.

*which also has been a popular idea long before 19th century philosophy of history, as in that rhyme "For want of a nail" etc


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## tdc (Jan 17, 2011)

Kreisler jr said:


> As for the original question. The "exotism" of Rimsky had been quite common in the late 19th century and the interest in "real" ethnic music was also a widespread phenomenon. Cf. Debussy and Gamelan, Bartok, RVW or already Grieg collecting music from rural backwaters.
> *So we might have an alternative Firebird by Rimsky* and we might not have the other early Stravinsky ballets either but he could still have developed in roughly similar ways with a few years delay. Or maybe not.


According to Taruskin, Rimsky would not compose a ballet, and would never accept a commission from Diaghilev who he considered "the decadent of all Russian decadents".

However aside from that you may be right, had Stravinsky developed in Russia, it may have been similar although we might have gotten earlier symphonies or orchestral works rather than ballet.

However there did seem to be a special connection with Diaghilev and Stravinsky, and Stravinsky seemed to realize this. He outlived Diaghilev by more than 40 years, and still chose to be buried near his grave in Venice.

(I only glanced at your points about _War and Peace_. I'm still not finished with that book and for some reason I like to avoid other's thoughts on works like this until I'm through the book. I skipped the foreword too! I'll read it after.)


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## Reichstag aus LICHT (Oct 25, 2010)

tdc said:


> I only glanced at your points about _War and Peace_. I'm still not finished with that book and for some reason I like to avoid other's thoughts on works like this until I'm through the book


"... it's about some Russians"

- Woody Allen


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

Sorry, I got the point about Rimsky wrong. But then take a less lazy Liadov as alternative or Tcherepnin or whoever was around. 
I cannot imagine that Stravinsky would have been impeded by a longer lived Rimsky for long if he had really wanted to write ballets.
The Ballets Russes in Paris would not have been hindered by a living Rimsky either although they might not have been allowed to take his Sheherazade.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballets_Russes

As I wrote, I think both the fascination of exotism and search for an alternative to fin de siecle late romanticism with the help of ethnic music was quite common at the time. Clearly, the collaboration with Ballets Russes and Stravinsky's early ballets gave this a huge boost or took it to another level that was highly influential but a similar development could have happened with suites or tone poems instead of ballets. And it was only a few years before the 1917 revolution. After this many Russians would go to Paris (or Berlin) anyway.

I think War and Peace is more enjoyable ignoring the "theoretical" bits.  
The core point as I remember it is quite simple, tha "Great Men" (here mainly Napoleon) don't matter much compared with anonymous historical forces and accidents.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

For me, Stravinsky doesn't get interesting until 1916 (Renard), so I couldn't care less if he had never met Diaghilev.


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## Livly_Station (Jan 8, 2014)

Of all "what if's", the most intriguing ones are if some composers had lived longer and met the music of the next generation. 

Mozart and Beethoven.
Beethoven and the early romantics.
Etc. 

Some meetings could have been tragic to the history as we know it, lol.


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