The Étude pour Pianola is a 1917 composition for Pianola by Russian composer

Igor Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential composers of the ...

. The Étude was first published on music roll in 1921 and the premiere was given by

Reginald Reynolds Reginald Arthur Reynolds (1905 – 16 December 1958) was a British left wing writer, poet, a Quaker and an anti-colonial activist who collaborated with M.K. Gandhi and Horace Alexander. A Quaker, he was General Secretary of the No More W ...

at Aeolian Hall in

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

, on 13 October of that year.

Composition

As Stravinsky was finishing ''

Les Noces ''Les Noces'' (French for The Wedding; russian: Свадебка, ''Svadebka'') is a ballet and orchestral concert work composed by Igor Stravinsky for percussion, pianists, chorus, and vocal soloists. The composer gave it the descriptive title " ...

'', he traveled to

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

and became inspired by Spanish music for future compositions. This étude was commissioned by

Aeolian Company The Aeolian Company was a musical-instrument making firm whose products included player organs, pianos, sheet music, records and phonographs. Founded in 1887, it was at one point the world's largest such firm. During the mid 20th century, it surpas ...

, as a demonstration piece for their new sensible-to-dynamic-shadings player piano. Stravinsky finished it in 1917. However, it became much more popular later in 1928, when he orchestrated this piece together with the

Three Pieces for String Quartet Three Pieces for String Quartet is a composition by Russian composer Igor Stravinsky. It was finished in 1914, revised in 1918, and eventually published in 1922. Composition As most of the works by Igor Stravinsky, this three-movement work was a ...

. The étude was retitled "Madrid", and the orchestration of all four pieces, titled Quatre études pour orchestre, was premiered in 1930.

Analysis

This is one of the first compositions for pianola to include dynamic shadings. The original score consists of six staves, which means three pianists are required to perform the piece. However,

Soulima Stravinsky Sviatoslav Soulima Stravinsky () (23 September 191028 November 1994) was a Swiss-American pianist, composer, and musicologist. As a pianist, he was considered an important interpreter of the works of his father, Igor Stravinsky, but as a composer ...

later rearranged the orchestral score into a version for two pianos which included most of the original work's compositional density.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Etude pour pianola 1917 compositions Compositions by Igor Stravinsky Compositions for player piano