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Donald Macleod explores the life and work of Igor Stravinsky, today focusing on the composer's first years in the United States.

1939 was clearly a pivotal year in world history. Igor Stravinsky wrote to a friend: 'My house, my family is destroyed - I no longer have anything to do in Paris.' He was seemingly, understandably, distraught at his wife Katya’s death, despite his far from loving treatment of her during her lifetime. This was something his children would resent for ever.

Now, Stravinsky was further removed from his native Russia and alienated in his adoptive country of France. Although in deep mourning, he chose to accept an offer of a professorship at Harvard University for a year and set sail for the USA, alone, at the outbreak of war, at the end of September 1939.

Tango
Oxana Shevchenko, piano

Ebony Concerto (1st and 2nd movements)
Woody Herman and his Orchestra

Scherzo a la Russe
City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra
Simon Rattle, conductor

Symphony in Three Movements
London Symphony Orchestra
Michael Tilson Thomas, conductor

Rake's Progress: Act I Scene 3 (excerpt)
Monteverdi Choir
London Symphony Orchestra
John Eliot Gardiner, conductor

Mass (Kyrie, Gloria)
Netherlands Chamber Choir
Schoenberg Ensemble
Reinbert De Leeuw, conductor

Produced in Cardiff by Martin Williams