Wikipedia:Today's featured article/November 22, 2006



Igor Stravinsky was a Russian-born composer. Although he composed primitivist, neo-classical and serial works, he is best known for three compositions from his earlier, Russian period: The Firebird, Petrushka, and The Rite of Spring. These daring and innovative ballets practically reinvented the genre. Stravinsky also wrote for a wide range of ensembles in a broad spectrum of classical forms, ranging from opera and symphonies to piano miniatures and works for jazz band. Stravinsky also achieved fame as a pianist and conductor, often at the premieres of his own works. He was also a writer; with the help of Alexis Roland-Manuel, Stravinsky compiled a theoretical work entitled Poetics of Music in which he famously claimed that music was incapable of "expressing anything but itself." A quintessentially cosmopolitan Russian, Stravinsky was one of the most influential composers and artists of 20th century music, both in the West and in his native land. He was named by Time magazine as one of the most influential people of the century. (more...)

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