“On the System of Stravinsky’s Harmony” by Yuri Kholopov

Abstract

Yuri Kholopov is generally regarded as the foremost Russian music theorist in the latter half of the twentieth century. Though he published articles in a wide array of topics, he was happiest when discussing twentieth-century concepts; it was to this end that he devoted a large part of his life’s work. The essay by Kholopov translated in the present article is from 1997, six years before he died. There are several significant points that he makes with respect to Stravinsky’s music. First, Kholopov links a quotation from Stravinsky on harmony to Sergei Taneev’sInvertible Counterpoint in the Strict Style, thus suggesting that by borrowing ideas from Taneev, the Petersburg-based Stravinsky was influenced by the Moscow-based Taneev. This speaks to a possible Russian influence on Stravinsky aside from Rimsky-Korsakov, whose influence on Stravinsky is not in doubt. Second, Kholopov posits a new fundamental “neotonality” in Stravinsky’s music, which exhibits a “central element” (CE) to which all other tones gravitate. Third, Kholopov’s work situates octatonicism into a broader framework of Stravinsky’s compositional practices. Ultimately, it is but one aspect of this music and is not emphasized as a fundamental structural element in Stravinsky’s music, as it is in writings by Arthur Berger, Pieter van den Toorn, and Richard Taruskin, for example. Fourth, in the section on polarity, Kholopov posits that when Stravinsky uses this term in relation to his music, he may have meant to say “stability,” which was a term from the writings of Boleslav Yavorsky that most Russian musicians knew in the early twentieth century. This reinterpretation of polarity sheds new light on this most important concept in Stravinsky studies. Lastly, there is the idea that Stravinsky was, in fact, a serial composer for his entire life. Of course, Stravinsky famously claimed so himself late in life; Kholopov solidifies this claim, traces the evolution of Stravinsky’s serial works, and finds an intriguing four-note series inFirebird.

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