[PRE-ORDER] Stravinsky: Le Sacre Du Printemps / Sym Of Psalms [CD]

Following Igor Stravinsky's fairy-tale ballet L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird) in it's complete version (released by BR-KLASSIK on CD 900231), Sir Simon Rattle has now performed the Russian composer's ballet Le sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring). Composed a few years later, it was likewise premiered by the famous Ballets Russes in Paris. The live recording of the latest Munich concerts on October 1 and 2, 2026, is now being released on CD, alongside Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms. A recording of the narrative ballet Petrushka is planned as the third CD.Before the First World War, especially for the famous ballet ensemble Les Ballets Russes, one of the most important dance companies of the 20th century, and it's impresario Sergei Diaghilev, Igor Stravinsky composed the first three of his great ballet music works for large orchestra, indeed, the most important of his ballets in general L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird) in 1910, Petrushka in 1911, and Le sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring) in 1913. The third, regarded as a key work of 20th-century music due to it's extraordinary rhythmic and tonal structures, can be experienced on this new CD from BR-KLASSIK - in a latest live recording with the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks under it's chief conductor Sir Simon Rattle, and in masterly interpretations.Diaghilev, a formative figure in 20th-century ballet, had founded the Ballets Russes ensemble in 1909 in Paris, where it first performed before moving to Monte Carlo in 1911. The first performance of Stravinsky's Le sacre du printemps premiered on May 29, 1913 in the newly-built Theâtre des Champs-elysees - a day that went down in history as one of the great artistic scandals of the 20th century. The furious protests from the Parisian public combined with the highly negative critical reviews all ended up making Stravinsky famous. His truly futuristic music has now established itself internationally and is an integral part of concert programs, and one can still hear why it so enraged audiences over 100 years ago.'The Psalms are poems of exaltation, but also of anger and judgment, and even of curses, ' wrote Stravinsky about his Symphony of Psalms, a three-movement symphonic work for choir and orchestra. The work was composed in 1930 during a time of personal tragedy. 'It is not a work that offers easy consolation, and the God it portrays can be stern, even cruel, ' says Simon Rattle. The unusual orchestration - with strong woodwind and brass, percussion instruments, two pianos and only the bass strings (violoncellos, double basses) without violins or violas - gives the work it's distinctive sound. Yet the symphony is equally suffused with moments of otherworldly serenity and beauty.