20th Century Composers: Igor Stravinsky

Part of the 20th Century Composers series.

Igor Stravinsky (1882-1971) was the great inventor and discoverer of modern music, a figure comparable in fertility, versatility and influence to his close friend and contemporary Pablo Picasso. He has been the subject of a vast literature of musical analysis and biographical anecdote, and his scores, sketches and voluminous personal papers have been much studied. But a comprehensive biography for the general listener, tracing the influences that formed his style, setting all his major works in context but without the use of technical language has not appeared in English in the two decades since Stravinsky's death.

This book fills that gap, devoting particular attention to his childhood in pre-Revolutionary Russia, whose formative influence Stravinsky acknowledged later in life. His discovery by the great impresario Diaghilev, his fruitful collaborations with such choreographers as Mikhail Fokine and George Balanchine, and with many of the great dancers (Nijinsky, Karsavina), painters and designers (Bakst, Picasso) of his time are fully described, as well as his relationships with such writers as Cocteau, Gide and W.H. Auden. Above all the book concentrates on Stravinsky's creativity, describing how his musical mind worked and relating this to his complex and fascinating personality.

Includes black-and-white illustrations.