Track Listing

1. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Introduction
2. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Harbingers of Spring
3. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Mock Abduction
4. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Spring Rounds
5. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Games of the Rival T
6. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Procession of the Wi
7. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Adoration of the Ear
8. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 1. The Adoration of the Earth. Dance of the Earth
9. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 2. The Sacrifice. Introduction
10. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 2. The Sacrifice. Mystic Circles of the Young Girls
11. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 2. The Sacrifice. Glorification of the Chosen One
12. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 2. The Sacrifice. Summoning of the Ancients
13. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 2. The Sacrifice. Ritual of the Ancients
14. Le Sacre du printemps (The Rite of Spring), ballet in 2 parts for orchestra: Part 2. The Sacrifice. Sacrificial Dance (Chosen One)
15. Fireworks (Feu D'artifice), fantasy for orchestra, Op. 4
16. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: Introduction
17. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: The Firebird and Its Dance
18. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: Variation of the Firebird
19. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: Pas de deux (Firebird and Ivan Csarevich)
20. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: Scherzo (Dance of the Princesses)
21. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: The Round of the Princesses
22. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: Infernal Dance of King Kastchei
23. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: Berceuse
24. L'oiseau de feu (The Firebird), concert suite for orchestra No. 2: Finale

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #89373 in Music
• Brand: RCA
• Released on: 1991-04-05
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .21 pounds

Customer Reviews

A fine recording of Stravinsky's best
On this recording, Ozawa masterfully conducts the jarring primitivism of the Rite of Spring, a ballet so feverish and violently lush it never fails to evoke enormous emotional responses from anybody I play it for. The Firebird is similarly excellent. The finale, in particular, is infused with every ounce of the raw beauty it deserves. The modulations in volume are handled particularly well, and the tempo seems dead-on. Though by no means the best recording of Stravinsky I've ever heard, this deserves a spot in the collection of any serious modern classical music fan.

Best consumed loud and proud
Stravinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps is one of the greatest artistic conceptions of the 20th century. The raw, primitive feel of the musical material is legendary itself, due in large part to its role in Disney's Fantasia, but in its staged version Le Sacre also managed to completely blow the popular perception of what a ballet was supposed to be. Audiences rioted at its 1913 premiere in Paris, disgusted by its overt eroticism, a similar reaction to that which had condemned Carmen to commercial failure four decades earlier. And similarly to Bizet's masterpiece, it took years for audiences to warm to its forward-looking, ultrarealistic elements, but once they did, its place in the pantheon was cemented permanently. To this day, it remains an unsurpassed landmark in the creative use of extreme dissonance, extended instrumental technique, and ever-shifting, never-settled, barless rhythmical patterns.

Ozawa's 1968 performance of Le Sacre with the CSO is fierce, crisp, and extremely clean. The brass players are emotionally wide-ranging and bold, the woodwinds are poignant and technically acute, and the strings compete with both remarkably well on all fronts. The brisk tempi seem not to pose much difficulty for the players, and the urgency of the conception is irresistible.

The Firebird is less of an icon than Le Sacre, but it too is a masterwork from the golden period of Stravinsky's life, when his creative instincts were in full harmony with his erudition and his works were as satisfying to the public at large as they were to professors and theoreticians. This performance is of the 1945 suite (which contains more of the original ballet's material than the 1919 suite), though with the Pantomime movement seemingly omitted. The lushness and warmth of Leinsdorf's very Romantic reading provides a nice counterpoint to Ozawa's ferocity in the first half of the disc. The BSO's strings lilt as well as they scythe, and the feeling of this very large orchestra fading to a whisper in unison, then rising out of it, is magical.

I simply cannot detect the faults that other reviewers of this CD have pointed out. This is a superb disc and represents a fine value.

An excellent Chicago recording from Ozawa's early years
Seiji Ozawa's Stravinsky LE SACRE DU PRINTEMPS is a very good recording. I give this 5 stars because it has a single minded purpose behind the driving rhythms, so prevalent in Stravinsky's pivotal and forever famous ballet score. Ozawa showed alot of promise in his early years, and this recording, from 1968 when he was just 33, was made 5 years before he became music director of the Boston Symphony, (1973) succeeding outgoing conductor William Steinberg.

RCA's 1968 analog sound is very good in LE SACRE, and equally as fine in FIREWORKS (Ozawa) and FIREBIRD Suite (Erich Leinsdorf/Boston Symphony).

Ozawa's tempos in SACRE are very fast, and some may prefer a more expansive approach to parts of the score. But I found it very enjoyable, and for variety have several other recordings of LE SACRE: Colin Davis/Concertgebouw (Philips), Karel Ancerl/Czech Philharmonic (Supraphon), Claudio Abbado/London Symphony (DG), Antal Dorati/Detroit Symphony (Decca). It's hard to name just ONE preferred recording for Stravinsky's SACRE since it is such a complex, colorful, fascinating work, but Ozawa's can hold company with the best. Recommended, and a bargain, too.