Michael Tilson Thomas celebrates one of the greatest composers of the 20th century, his mentor Igor Stravinsky. Step right up for the carnivalesque Petrushka as it delves into a tale of puppets, ballerinas and more with Stravinsky’s signature flair and jaunting rhythms.

After the smash success of The Firebird in 1910, Stravinsky proposed creating another over-the-top score for the Ballets Russes, this one based on prehistoric pagan sacrifice, an idea that would soon become The Rite of Spring. But first, as he later recorded in his autobiography, “I wanted to refresh myself by composing an orchestral piece in which the piano would play the most important part.” The music he conceived brought to mind “a distinct picture of a puppet, suddenly endowed with life, exasperating the patience of the orchestra with diabolical cascades of arpeggi.”

When Serge Diaghilev, the impresario behind the Ballets Russes, visited Stravinsky in Switzerland, he heard those first sketches and, as Stravinsky remembered it, “He was so much pleased with it that he would not leave it alone and began persuading me to develop the theme of the puppet’s sufferings and make it into a whole ballet.” Together they shaped a plot: “The fair, with its crowd, its booths, the little traditional theater, the character of the magician, with all his tricks; and the coming to life of the dolls—Petrushka, his rival and the dancer—and their love tragedy, which ends with Petrushka’s death.”

-- © 2020 Aaron Grad

Originally performed January 25, 2020.