Photograph by Johan Persson reprinted by permission of the Royal Opera House

Transcription

1 WO Photograph by Johan Persson reprinted by permission of the Royal Opera House Marika Kuzma direts hoirs at the University of California, Berkeley, and has also been hef de hoeur for the Montreal Symphony. A winner of the ACDA Julius Herford Prize, she has published artiles and given talks internationally on Slavi musi, inluding letures at the Kiev and Mosow Conservatories. She has also served as a Russian dition liniian and onsultant to many hoirs, and her supertitle translation of Svadebka has been used in performanes at Davies Symphony Hall in San Franiso and Carnegie Hall in New York City. mkuzma@berkeley.edu

2 RDPLAY In Stravinsky s Svadebka M a r i k a C. K u z m a This is the fi rst of a two-part artile. Part II will appear in the February 2012 issue. Рай, рай! удалый скоморошек! Rai, rai! udalïy skomoroshek! Play, play! bold minstrel! From Tableau I, Svadebka IN known variously as Svadebka, Les Noes, or Stravinsky sholarship, muh attention has been devoted to the sore and ballet The Wedding. There are artiles that explore its pith material and rhythmi vitality or hart the phases of Svadebka's instrumentation. There are several detailed and areful English translations of the libretto, disussions of its prosody, and essays explaining Russian wedding rituals. Rihard Taruskin s hapter devoted to Les Noes The Turanian Pinnale in his Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions is, in and of itself, a book within a book. 1 Compared to the rather exhaustive disussion of Igor Stravinsky s genius as a omposer and orhestrator in this work and in general, relatively little has been written about Stravinsky s leverness as a wordsmith: how he tinkers with words and phonemes on a small and large sale in Svadebka to reate wordplay. The epigraph (above) omes from the fi rst musial limax of the work and features a word that sometimes onfounds translators of its libretto. The exlamation Рай! or Rai! is ommon in Russian folk songs as a somewhat nonsensial expression of joy. It an also be understood literally as either the word rai (paradise) or as a ontration of the word igrai (play). Translators typially and of neessity hoose one meaning or the other. Stravinsky, however, seems to seize on the possibility for a double entendre and projets both meanings at one in his sore. In the ontext of the libretto, the meaning igrai (play) makes most sense. Leading up to this phrase, the women of the horus sing heerful songs to omfort the despondent bride and refer to the groom Khvetis as a solovey, a nightingale whose whistling and singing will entertain her day and night. Subsequently, in the phrase quoted above, they refer to him as a skomoroshek, a type of roving performer known in Russian and Ukrainian folk ulture whose musi-making, daning, poetry, and drama aptivates his publi. 2 The ommand igrai in Russian means both strike an instrument or engage in a game, just as play does in English. In reading the phrase within the libretto, independent of the musial ontext, the meaning play CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5 9

3 W O R D P L A Y makes immediate sense: Play, play! Bold minstrel! Khvetis is ompelled to sing like a solovey and play with musial instruments, theatriality, and games like a skomoroshek. Within Stravinsky s sore, however, the meaning paradise makes equal sense. The words Rai, rai! arrive at Rehearsal 16, marking the fi rst entrane of the men s horus in union with the women s horus and featuring rather high, estati singing. The rowd of singers urge the nightingale/ minstrel bridegroom to play or entertain his bride and onvine her that their union, or onsummation, will be joyful, perhaps even taking her to paradise. Although the meaning of rai as play makes the most sense grammatially, the meaning paradise omes aross at this musial limax viserally and emotively in pith and dynami level. Both meanings, play and paradise, like the female and male voies, fuse at this moment, reinforing eah other. 3 The syllable rai! at Rehearsal 16 thus represents a literal and fi gurative play on words embedded in Stravinsky s sore. In this example and in others to be explored in this artile, Stravinsky emerges as a kind of skomoroshek: a lever wizard of words and musi. When we hear, sing, or ondut Svadebka, details of language their humor and symbolism are often lost. Even to native Russian speakers, muh of the text an seem a blur. After all, the work fl ies by in a heartbeat: Coteau alled it a raing ar. 4 It is more of a ollage of verses than a narrative. C. F. Ramuz wrote, At any given moment there are at least four texts, literary and musial, sometimes interrupted and sueeded by others. 5 Stravinsky himself ompared it to one of those senes in Ulysses in whih the reader seems to be overhearing sraps of onversation without the onneting thread of disourse. 6 In the ourse of onduting Svadebka several times, various words and phrases nevertheless have aught the author s attention while studying or onduting the sore. 7 She has felt the urge to turn to the horus or audiene to ask: Is it just me, or is Stravinsky making a pun here? Yet, in rehearsal, the horal diretor s main objetive has been to line Title page to the sketh sore of the 1917 version of Svadebka. Transliteration of Stravinsky's handwriting: "Svadebka, At I, Igor Stravinsky." Note Stravinsky's faniful drawing and border. Reprodution ourtesy of the New York Publi Library. up the rhythms and make the words sound reasonably Russian. In onert, the ondutor must fous primarily on holding all the fores together without dropping a beat. It would be inappropriate partiularly with this piee where momentum is so muh of its musial essene to press pause to share linguisti musing. Also, as with any foreignlanguage joke, multilingual explanations take some time. By the time one might fi nish explaining the wordplay in rehearsal or in onert, most of the humor would be lost along with ten minutes of rehearsal time or a portion of the audiene. In Part I of this artile, the author shares several examples of what she pereives to be Stravinsky s linguisti whimsy and prowess in speifi moments of Svadebka. Whether Stravinsky intended this wordplay to be intelligible to the listener or the singers, or that it remain fl eeting and impereptible, he likely took private delight in his raft or inside jokes. Part II of this artile is about how the elemental sounds of words might have played into his design for the work as a whole. Whether he intended that his audiene mentally grasp his manipulation of phonemes on a larger sale, Stravinsky likely wanted the sonorous effet to be palpable. In The Beginning Was The Word: The Libretto And Russian Folk-Pronuniation Syllables and verses were Stravinsky s point of origin in Svadebka. The driving rhythms and many moods of the words animate the musi. As Robert Craft wrote of Stravinsky s proess in omposing eah of his voal works: In the beginning was the word. 8 Stravinsky had imagined a dane antata on a folk wedding as early as 1912, but it was only after he found and purhased Piotr Kireevsky s folk-song olletion 9 in a Kiev bookstore in 1914 that he began to formulate onrete ideas. The olletion, published posthumously in 1911, inludes the text of songs Kireevsky heard and transribed in the ourse of deades of researh in villages aross Russia and Ukraine. It also inludes authenti folk-song texts that Kireevsky soliited from some eighty ontributors and several faux-folk verses penned by Pushkin and Gogol. Kireevsky transribed all the songs unadulterated, verbatim, and literatim to preserve the loal olor. 10 Likewise, Stravinsky preserves virtually all the verbal and orthographi idiosynraies when quoting the songs in Svadebka. In putting together the libretto, however, Stravinsky does more than pedantially ut and paste the work of his ountrymen ethnographers. Throughout Svadebka, Stravinsky adds, subtrats, rearranges, and musially highlights syllables and words in order to enhane the haraterization of his ast of villagers or in order to tuk a quik pun into the sore. His manipulation of text also undersores the overarhing symbolism of Svadebka. In order to appreiate Stravinsky s raft in many of the wordplay examples that follow, some understanding of Russian 10 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5

4 In Stravinsky s Svadebka pronuniation, partiularly folk versus urban pronuniation, is neessary. 11 Svadebka Les noes The Wedding is treaherous to perform in any language, but Russian poses partiular hallenges. At a performane at the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg that the author attended in 2004, even the virtuosi, youthful Russian horus oasionally was pressed to fi t in all the syllables with their ompound onsonants in tempo. 12 Aside from the hallenge of artiulating the words in rapid suession, both Slavi and non-slavi hoirs fae the fundamental hallenge of hoosing how to pronoune the words in the fi rst plae. Even in the famous reording by the Pokrovsky Ensemble, meant to adhere stritly to an authenti folk style of singing and to maintain folk dialet, the soloists and horus oasionally differ in their pronuniation of the same words. 13 Muh of the disussion and disagreement about the pronuniation of Svadebka s libretto pertains to vowels or, more preisely, the pronuniation of vowels in unaented syllables. In standard, modern, urban Russian, the o vowel is modifi ed, or redued aording to aentuation. A prototypial word used to demonstrate the proess of vowel redution is the word молоко, transliterated letter-for-letter moloko (and meaning milk ). In modern urban Russian, the word is pronouned muh-lah-ko, approximating in IPA: [mл-lɐ-kɔ] or [mǝ-la-kɔ]. As a general rule, the less aented (or the farther from an aented syllable) and less sustained the syllable in musial setting, the more the vowel is redued to an [a] or, further, to a kind of shwa [ᵊ] or [л] sound. This proess of altering the unstressed o vowel toward a is so standard in Russian, it is given its own term: akanye (ah-ing). There also ex e a e The University of Notre Dame Master of Sared Musi Degree Appliation deadline: January 1, 2011 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5 11

5 W O R D P L A Y ists a related pratie: ikanye (ee-ing), the proess of reduing unstressed eh [ɛ] or ah [a] into ee [i]. The aent in Mosow today is known for its exaggerated akanye and ikanye. Residents of St. Petersburg sometimes mok Mosow dwellers for the way they pronoune the unaented fi rst syllable of their home ity Москва (Moskva) with broad akanye: MahskVA. Even in English, we typially pronoune the fi rst syllable of Mosow with a kind of akanye: Mahsaw. An example of ikanye among today s Mosow residents might be the manner in whih they pronoune the fi rst syllable of the omposer Thaikovsky s name: CheeKOVsky. Kireevsky and Stravinsky s texts, however, do not ome from modern-day Mosow but rather ombine verses from an earlier entury and from provinial regions of Russia and Ukraine, together with oasional verses in Churh Slavi. 14 As with any language, the pronuniation of Russian hanges from era to era, region to region, high ulture to low, aording to speed of pronuniaз tion, and depending on ontext. In Russian, unaented syllables in partiular vary in vowel pronuniation, depending upon time, manner(s), and plae. In many provinial areas of Russia, the loal pronuniation evades vowel redution altogether, and words sound generally as they appear in the written word. For example, natives of the Volga region pronoune the word молоко simply as moloko [mɔlɔkɔ], with eah o vowel distint and pure. The evasion of vowel redution, akanye, among village populations and the preservation of the o sound regardless of syllabi aent has been given the onverse term okanye (oh-ing). Thus, in Russian, the standard written spelling often refl ets a pronuniation pratied urrently only in more remote and, ironially, perhaps less literate areas. 15 Churh Slavi, the elesiastial language of the Slavi Orthodox Churh, also has evaded vowel redution, and vowels are pronouned as written. Whereas a modern The Oberlin Conservatory of Musi, awarded the 2009 National Medal of Arts by President Barak Obama Mihael Manderen Diretor of Admissions The Oberlin Conservatory of Musi Off ie of Admissions 39 West College Street Oberlin, OH [P] [W] David H. Stull Dean of the Conservatory Russian speaker might pronoune the Russian word благослови (the ommand form of the verb to bless ) as bla-guhsla-vi [bla-gл-sla-vi], the same word in Churh Slavi would be pronouned with the pure vowels bla-go-slo-vi [bla-gɔslɔ-vi] as written. The entral question of pronuniation in Svadebka, then, is how muh to apply vowel redution and how muh to obey the vowel sounds letter for letter indiated on Stravinsky s page. In 2001, the author disussed the issue of vowel redution in Svadebka with Aleksey Martinov, a well-known Russian tenor and member of the voie faulty at the Mosow Conservatory. Martinov is also the tenor soloist in the famous Hungaroton reording of Svadebka made in the 1970s. 16 He asserted, fi rst, that the standard pronuniation of urrent Russian differs radially from the standard pronuniation of Stravinsky s day. Stalin s regime, he said, insisted on an urban proletarian pronuniation with strong akanye and ikanye in its media broadasts and offi ial parlane, and the pratie of vowel redution beame only more exaggerated with time. Seond, neither urrent nor former urban Russian bears a lose enough orrelation to the village dialet(s) and pronuniation assoiated with Stravinsky s texts in Svadebka. Martinov ontends that using urrent Mosow Russian, although it may make the language more intelligible to a modern, urban audiene, does not refl et the language of Stravinsky s imagination and is inappropriate to the ethos of the piee. In the Hungaroton reording, Martinov and his fellow soloists onsiously modeled their pronuniation on that of his grandmother from a remote Russian village, and the reording is quite onsistent in its overriding okanye. Making informed hoies as to how muh or how little to adopt akanye, ikanye, okanye, et. is stylistially important in performing and interpreting Russian musi in general. Making suh informed hoies in Svadebka is ritial not only to sounding authenti, but also to onveying the haraterizations Stravinsky intends. An English language equivalent to the differenes between the modern Mosow aent, a Volga provinial dialet, and Churh Slavi dition might be 12 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5

6 In Stravinsky s Svadebka the differenes between a Bronx, Great Plains, and high Anglian aent. If one were to sing Rogers and Hammerstein s Oklahoma with either a Bronx or Anglian-English pronuniation, something would be missing. Similarly, if one sings Svadebka with modern Mosow pronuniation, something vital is lost in the overall effet and affet of the piee. 17 A keen understanding of Russian pronuniation is also ritial to diserning Stravinsky s genius at wordplay in Svadebka. Example 1 Tomato Versus Tomahto; Kosal Versus Kasal 18 There are moments in Svadebka in whih pronuniation the hoie of tomato versus tomahto, or [mл-la-kɔ] versus [mɔlɔkɔ] is key. Without the right vowel, one might as well all the whole wedding off. 19 The very fi rst word and syllable of Svadebka poses a question of pronuniation. A modern, urban Russian reading of the word Косаль (transliterated Kosal' and meaning braid ), wherein the fi rst syllable is unaented, would render the pronuniation kasal' [ka-sal j ] or [kл-sal j ]. The following word моя (transliterated moya ), orrespondingly subjet to akanye would be maya [ma-ja]. Various reordings adopt this pronuniation. 20 Stravinsky, however, almost ertainly intends the two words to be pronouned without modern urban akanye, preserving the o sound: [kɔ-sal j ] and [mɔ-ja]. Stravinsky signals okanye in several ways. First, he sets the initial syllable of kosal on an aented beat, the aent reinfored by perussion, and on a sustained pith. It is as if he is warning do not treat this as an unaented syllable. Likewise, he plaes the fi rst syllable of moya on an aented beat. Seond, Stravinsky returns to the opening syllable ko on an aented beat at the end of the fi rst phrase as well. The repetition of ko at the end of the line sounds as an exlamation and provides a kind of musial and textual frame. To Stravinsky, the fi rst and last syllable of the phrase is not a neutral, passing syllable but overt. Stravinsky seems "Plaiting of the braid." Natalia Gonharova's 1923 line drawing of Nizhinska's horeography for the opening tableau of Svadebka. to insist that the bride s fi rst outry be on the vowel o. 21 The repetition of ko syllable at the end of the phrase, inidentally, is not found in the original Kireevsky. Kireevsky, Song #421, in Cyrilli and transliterated: Коса ль моя, косынька русая! Kosa l' moya, kosïñka rusaya! Stravinsky in Cyrilli and transliterated: Косаль моя ко коса моя косынька русая! Kosal' moya ko kosa moya kosïñka rusaya! The pratie of adding a syllable as the fi rst portion of a word, or apoope, at the end of a phrase is standard to Russian folk songs, and partiularly to the folk-song lament (alled plah ). Here, in the middle of the bride s soliloquy, the apoope onveys the effet of not being able to fi nish the word or being interrupted by a gasp for air mid sob. If indeed the soprano sings the fi rst syllable as ko, preserving the vowel with peasant okanye, she immediately signals that the bride is not a ity girl. Urban Russians even today mok and ariature ountry folk for their overuse of o and evasion of akanye. The more exaggerated the o vowel, the learer and more immediate the folk haraterization of the bride. By inserting the syllable ko at the end of the opening phrase, Stravinsky also projets an immediate assoiation with folk song. 22 Stravinsky s folk haraterization village bride and village song is omplete by the end of the very fi rst phrase. In the seond part of this artile, the author will further explore how the predominane of the vowel o in this opening lament of the bride also serves to differentiate her harater from that of the groom. Example 2 What s in a Name? Another example of Stravinsky s hand in rafting his libretto that omes early in the sore is the name he assigns to the groom: Хветисъ (Khvetis). The names of the bride and groom are fi xed relatively early in the piee: the name for the bride, Nastasia, fi rst appearing at Rehearsal 2 and the name for the groom, Khvetis, at Rehearsal 12. In the atual Kireevsky folk-song verse that Stravinsky quotes at Rehearsal 12, however, the groom s name is Filat. 23 The Kireevsky verse that Stravinsky quotes at the beginning of Tableau II, Rehearsal 27, about the groom s famous urls, shows his name to be Vasil. 24 Immediately thereafter at Rehearsal 29, the folk-song verse that Stravinsky quotes shows the name Viktor. 25 The name Khvetis for the groom does appear in a rather extensive setion of Kireevsky s olletion: Songs #480 to 515 from the Tambov region. Stravinsky quotes those partiular songs sattered throughout Svadebka, the fi rst of these ap- CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5 13

7 W O R D P L A Y pearing just before Rehearsal In these songs from Tambov, however, the name of the bride paired with Khvetis is Agafi ushka. Obviously, Stravinsky needed to hoose a single name for the bride and groom for the whole dane antata. It seems then that Stravinsky surveyed all the various possible names for the bride and groom in Kireevsky s olletion and arefully pluked Nastasia and Khvetis for his work. 27 Why, of all names, would Stravinsky hoose Khvetis: a name so diffi ult to pronoune and relatively arduous to sing, even for native Russians? Whereas Filat, Vasil, and Viktor are rather standard, neutral names, Khvetis is a bastardized version of the standard Russian name Fetis. This folk distortion of his name identifi es the groom as someone perhaps unsophistiated or omial. 28 Stravinsky wants his listener to know from the outset that his groom is not just a peasant, but a ountry bumpkin. Example 3 Of Peasants and Priests A passage in the middle of Tableau II of Svadebka, Rehearsal 50 53, provides a rather multilayered example of Stravinsky s anny use of onsonants and vowels to reate omedi effet. The text for Rehearsal 50 omes from Song #130 in Kireevsky s olletion, or more preisely the onnetive prose that follows Song #130. Kireevsky original, Song #130: Благословите, отечь съ матерью, своего цаду ко стольну городу приступить, каменну стѣну разбить, свою сужену понять, въ соборъ черковъ (церковъ) сходить, златъ вѣнокъ принять, серебрянъ крѣстъ почѣловать. Kireevsky transliterated: Blagoslovite, oteh s mater iu, svoego tsadu ko stol'nu gorodu pristupit', kamennu stienu razbit, svoyu suzhenu poniat', v sobor herkov (tserkov ) skhodit, zlat vienok priniat, serebrian kriest pohielovat'. The words oteh, tsadu, and herkov, as they appear in Kireevsky and at Stravinsky s 14 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5

8 In Stravinsky s Svadebka Rehearsal 50, do not exist in standard Russian but refl et the regional aent or dialet of the Pskov provine, where the natives freely exhange the onsonant sounds ts and h. (Kireevsky even plaes tserkov in parentheses beside herkov to indiate the standard Russian word). This pratie of transposing ts and h, alled tsokanye or hokanye, is ommon not only to this region, but also ommon to Slavi hildren s speeh in general. For example, one of my Ukrainian hildhood friends used to pronoune his own last name Chaikovsky as TSaikovsky. The exhange of h and ts seems ommon to other languages as well: one oasionally hears Amerian hildren pronoune heese as tseez. When we hear the transposition of h and ts, similar to the transposition of r, l, and w in English ( wabbit and wam for rabbit and lamb ) we assoiate it with a hild or with an intoxiated or unsophistiated adult, as in the artoon harater Elmer Fudd. Similarly, a Russian person hearing oteh, tsadu, or herkov (instead of otets, hadu, or tserkov ) would automatially assoiate the speaker of those words with a hild, a drunk, or a village hik. 29 The words sung at Rehearsal 50, however, are very solemn: Bless, O mother and father, this your hild to step to the altar, to enter the hurh and kiss the silver ross. The effet of these words being spelled and uttered with tsokanye is that of a simpleton trying to affet solemnity or even erudition. An equivalent in English might be an Elmer Fudd-type harater saying bwess us, o movew and favew to entew the tsurts and kiss the siwvew kwoss. Thus, the original Kireevsky text in and of itself with its folk orthography immediately would have struk Stravinsky as omial. Stravinsky amplifi es this lash of solemnity and lak of sophistiation, adding another layer of humor. Kireevsky speifi es that this text is ommuniated by the druzhka [best man] govorya [speaking]. Stravinsky, however, sets the verse to a melody, and the melody he hooses is a liturgial hant: the fi fth tone of traditional znamanny hant. In addition, he sets it not for a tenor soloist the lines of the best man are often sung by a tenor in Svadebka but for bass, and not for just one singer but for two low basses. In this way, the musial setting strongly refers to the singing of orthodox deaons, who are typially baritones and basses. Thus, Stravinsky adds a liturgial overlay to the mok solemnity of the moment. The effet is that of an Elmer Fuddovsky (or two) singing solemn words with a funny speeh distortion to a liturgial hant melody with feigned (basso) profundity. Stravinsky atually alters the original Kireevsky words even more in a folk diretion to make an even stronger impression that our groom, together with his fellow hanter, is unshooled. Kireevsky transliterated: Blagoslovite, oteh s mater iu, svoego tsadu ko stol'nu gorodu pristupit Conservatory of Musi at Wheaton College Choral Condutor Open Rank Stravinsky version transliterated (his hanges to spelling underlined): Boslovite, oteh s mater iu, svavo tsadu ko stol'nu gradu pristupit In Kireevsky, the fi rst word is Blagoslovite, the standard Churh Slavi or Russian word for bless. Stravinsky ontrats it to Boslovite. He might have subtrated the fi rst syllable simply to fi t the standard liturgial melody. In fat, he drops other syllables seemingly to help the text fi t the hant formula: svavo instead of svoego and gradu instead of gorodu. Nevertheless, in their shortened forms, the words Boslovite, svavo, and gradu take on an added feature of olloquialism, the slurring of syllables sometimes alled slurvian. An obvious example of slurring syllables in folk or olloquial Amerian English might be y all instead of you all or jeet jet instead of The Conservatory of Musi at Wheaton College invites appliations for a tenure-trak faulty position in Choral Musi to begin July 1, The ideal andidate will have an earned dotorate; horal experiene and aomplishment in higher eduation; signifi ant onduting experiene; ommitment to the liberal arts; an exellent reord of reruitment and program building; demonstrated disipleship and spiritual maturity; and strong interpersonal skills and the ability to work in a highly ollegial fashion. The teahing load would inlude onduting the Conert Choir and ould also inlude horal onduting, horal methods, musi eduation, and/or applied voie, depending on qualifi ations and experiene. Send a letter of interest, resume, and names and ontat information for referenes to Dr. Mary Hopper, Diretor, Conservatory of Musi Performane Studies, Wheaton College, 501 College Avenue, Wheaton, IL Review of appliations will begin Deember 14, 2011 and the position will remain open until fi lled. Appliation forms will be sent to promising appliants. Wheaton College is an evangelial Protestant Christian liberal arts ollege whose faulty and staff affi rm a Statement of Faith and adhere to lifestyle expetations of the Wheaton College Community Covenant. The College omplies with federal and state guidelines for nondisrimination in employment. Women and minority andidates are enouraged to apply. For more information about Wheaton College visit: CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5 15

9 W O R D P L A Y did you eat yet. 30 The lash of high and low ulture is still more pronouned if one adopts Churh Slavi dition for the fi rst word Boslovite. Modern Russians might pronoune the word with akanye as baslavite, hanging the fi rst vowel sounds from o to a, as it is sung on several reordings. 31 However, Stravinsky learly spells the word Boslovi here; although elsewhere, as at Rehearsal 58, he spells it Baslavi. In spelling the word Boslovi, he perhaps presribes Churh Slavi dition and signals that the singers should affet an elesiastial pronuniation while singing the hant tone. Thus he signals that our bass duo Elmer Fuddovsky should use elesiastial vowels in singing the hant melody while they are interhanging h and ts onsonants and while they are singing slurvian variants of words. The equivalent in English might be of singing plainhant with altered onsonants and ontrated words but with very affeted, high hurh vowels: GwOHwiah een shewsees DEH-oh. For many ondutors and singers, the passage at Rehearsal 50 to 53 is most memorable not for its humor but for the By Paul Brandvik Author of The Compleet Madrigal Dinner Booke THIRTY SCRIPTS, eah ontaining All DIALOGUE (inluding greeting, toasts, festivities, and humorous Renaissane play) neessary for A SUCCESSFUL MADRIGAL DINNER! For omplete info: VISIT OUR WEB SITE: knight-shtik press, ll Box 814, Bemidji, MN madrigaldinner@madrigaldinner.om diffiulty of negotiating its tempo hanges. The musial alternation between the two bass soloists and women s horus seems to be a series of unwarranted interruptions: a rashing halt followed by a few slow bass phrases with fast treble responses in the midst of the otherwise fastpaed tableau. This passage typially falls apart in rehearsal and requires great onentration and eye ontat among all performers in onert. Understanding the humor in the slow phrases might mitigate the diffi ulty. The lash of tempos atually adds to the humor, the women s fast singing offsetting the slow solemnity of the men s. It is as if the men are trying to at all serious and grown-up, posing as ordained deaons, 32 while the women hatter giddily in the sidelines. Example 4 A Wife Already! Another example of Stravinsky s play on words one that does not require a nuaned understanding of pronuniation ours at Rehearsal 126. Kireevsky s olletion of folk texts inludes a setion devoted to wedding toasts or jingles that would be delivered by the druzhko [best man, or master of eremonies]. Correspondingly, Stravinsky features a series of toasts from Rehearsal Photograph by Fred Fehl reprodued with the permission of Gabriel Pinski ourtesy of the New York Publi Library. 112 to 114 and Rehearsal 125 to 127 sung and spoken by the druzhko in a rapid-fi re, rap-like, rhymed patter. 33 To onlude this setion, Stravinsky quotes a rather pithy, simple toast from Kireevsky. Kireevsky s verse in Cyrilli and transliterated: Ну же ну, рюмочку пыпивай! Nu zhe nu, ryumohku vïpivay! The phrase Nu zhe nu is nonsensial and means roughly alright already. The full wedding toast might be translated: Alright already, drink ryumohka! or Alright already, drink up! 16 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5

10 In Stravinsky s Svadebka Stravinsky, however, alters the representation of Kireevsky s text in his sore and adds two syllables zhe nu : Stravinsky s version in Cyrilli and transliterated: Ну же, ну же, ну, рюмочку выпивай! Nu zhe, nu zhe, nu, ryumohku vïpivay! In doing so, he not only prolongs the phrase nu zhe nu into a fi ve-syllable palindrome nu zhe nu zhe nu, but also adds layers of meaning. The addition of the two syllables at the end an be interpreted simply as adding emphasis or impatiene to the phrase. Yet, the two syllables at the end, zhe nu, an also ome together to reate the oherent word zhenu. Zhenu is the ausative ase of woman or wife. Thus, in the ourse of the fi ve syllables, Stravinsky s phrase an be heard as morphing from alright already into a wife already. Stravinsky also alters the representation of the text by assigning it not to the tenor soloist, who has been ating as the druzhko [best man] in delivering the previous toasts, but to the bass soloist, who is inreasingly assoiated with the role of the groom. When the bass soloist interrupts the tenor s series of toasts at Rehearsal 126, it is as if the groom has grown impatient with all the toasting, and the phrase takes on great urgeny: Let s get on with this, I want my woman. Stravinsky even sets the phrase high in the bass range to add to the heightened exitement. Depending upon how little or how muh Stravinsky knew Ukrainian, he might even have intended a triple-entendre in this short phrase. Stravinsky spent many summers at his family s estate in a Ukrainian village Ustyluh (in Russian Ustilug or Yiddish Ustille ) as a hild. In slang Ukrainian, zhenu as a verb means I m running or, more olloquially, Gotta run. The three simultaneous meanings for this short interjetion would then beome: Alright already; A wife already; Gotta run. It is no oinidene that musially too, this moment at rehearsal 126 represents a rupture of sorts that initiates the thrust toward the fi nale, and the groom s ultimate possession of the bride. Prior to the bass exlamation, the melodi material had been on hold while the tenor delivered his spoken patter, the horus uttered short responses, and the pianos played vestiges of phrases. Right after the bass exlaims those fi ve syllables at his high pith, the horus and melody return to the foreground. The women of the horus sing a song about the river Volga overfl owing, omparing its urrent to the fore of the groom breaking down the door to his in-laws s house. At the same time, the bass, together with the men of the horus, take ontrol of an ostinato melody that drives the work to the fi nish line, or into the bedroom. In the original Kireevsky, the folk phrase is just a ouple of passing nonsensial syllables within the toast of the druzhko. With Stravinsky s added syllables and musial manipulation, this phrase beomes a major turning point in Svadebka. Example 5 Thik or Thin? In the ostinato passage from Rehearsal 127 to 128, there appears a urious phrase that has puzzled many Svadebka text-sleuths and translators: Stravinsky s stanza in Cyrilli and in transliteration: Эта, эта, эта хоть куда эта и таперъ стоитъ рубля, а как ей, ей бока надутъ за этаку и два дадутъ. Yeta, yeta, yeta khot' kuda yeta i taper stoit rublia, a kak yey, yey boka nadut' za yetaky i dva, dva dadut'. These words ome neither from Kireevsky nor from Tereshhenko, Stravinsky s other soure of folk verse 34 but probably from Stravinsky and his irle of family and friends. 35 If indeed they ome from Stravinsky either invented by him or transribed from something he or his friends heard this marks the one and only text in the libretto penned by Stravinsky: his own ameo ontribution. It is a passage having to do with how muh or little the bride is worth, one ruble or two, and has been translated in various, sometimes awkward ways. First, here are the translations found in the English and Frenh versions of the sore. The Wedding and Les Noes, where, of neessity, the translations are ompromised to fi t the rhythm of the musi: English version by D. Millar Craig: 36 This one, this one, this one, this is good, this one even now osts a rouble (si). But if you squeeze it in your hand, squeeze it tightly, it osts double that. Frenh version by Ramuz 37 and its English translation: Cell là, ell là vaut dans les dix sous, Dix sous, dix sous, est pas beauoup. Si, si on lui faisait un enfant Elle en vaudrait deux fois, fois autant. This one, this one, is worth ten sous, ten sous, that s not so muh. If, if, one were to add a baby to her, she would be worth twie as muh. Here now are versions by various translators unenumbered by rhythmi onstraints: Harkins: 38 This, this, this is good, and even now osts a ruble. But if you squeeze it tightly in your hand, then it is double, it osts double. Reeder/Comegno: 39 This one, this one, no matter where you go, she is now worth a ruble. And when her sides expand, for one like this, two, two [rubles] they ll give. Karlinsky: 40 This one, this one is good for anything, even now she is worth a ruble. But if you infl ate her sides, for that kind, they ll give you two. CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5 17

11 W O R D P L A Y And, fi nally, a translation that attempts rhyme. Levin/Pokrovsky: 41 This one, this one, she s full of spie, and a rouble (si) is still her prie. And if you blow her sides through, they d give even two. Most of the translators seemingly avoid the word куда ( kuda ) altogether. In isolation, the word kuda at the end of the fi rst line means where, or more preisely whither. The olloquial phrase хоть куда ( khot' kuda ), means good for anything or no matter what. Thus, Roberta Reeder and Arthur Comegno interpret the fi rst ouplet to mean This one [the bride] is worth a ruble wherever you go, and Simon Karlinsky paraphrases this as This one is good for anything and even now is worth a ruble. In this passage, however, kuda might also be onstrued as a distorted version of a different word. Stravinsky signals a folk aent already in the fi rst word: Эта ( yeta ) is a drunk or provinial version of eta. 42 Likewise, the words immediately preeding and following kuda, хоть (khot ) and таперъ (taper), are variations of the words хоч ( khoh, meaning although) and тепер ( teper, meaning now). Stravinsky might very well intend kuda as a distorted version of the word худа ( khuda ), whih means thin or skinny. Fatter women have traditionally been regarded as more valuable in Slavi folk ulture. In Ukraine, for example, the traditional phrase ти поправилася ( tï popravïlasia ) means both you have put on weight and you have improved yourself. It seems plausible, then, that Stravinsky intends: this one, even though thin, even now is worth one ruble. The seond phrase then makes even greater sense: if one should infl ate her side (make her fatter), she will be worth two rubles. Perhaps, as in the Frenh translation, the toast refers to making the bride not just fatter but rendering her with hild to make her more valuable. It is ommon in peasant wedding toasts to ajole the ouple about baby making. Whether Stravinsky intended this double entendre, he would likely have delighted in the two possible meanings of kuda/khuda wherever/thin. The Alpha and the Omega The examples mentioned above represent just a few fl eeting moments of wordplay in Svadebka, revealing that Stravinsky takes are in rafting syllables along with pithes and rhythms to reate his rih, vibrant sore. Just as the onsummate omposer shapes musial material on a global and loal level in this and all his works, he also is aware of the soni effet of words on a larger sale. The seond and fi nal part of this artile will ontain a disussion about how Stravinsky manipulates vowel sounds over the ourse of Svadebka to undersore symbolism and perhaps leave a deeper musial-dramati impression at the end of his work. NOTES 1 Rihard Taruskin, Stravinsky and the Russian Traditions, vol. 2 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), Skomoroshek, diminutive for skomorokh, is a term related perhaps to saramouhe and refers to a prominent type of ator-minstrel in Russian and Ukrainian ulture. Although they were banned by the hurh and by Tsar Alexei in the 17th entury, skomorokhs ontinued to fi gure prominently in village life. 3 There is yet another possible impliit meaning: the phrase играть свадьбу ( igrat' svad'bu ) means to elebrate or stage a wedding. 4 Eri Walter White, Stravinsky: A Critial Survey (London: J. Lehmann, 1947), A un moment donné, il n y avait pas moins de quatre texts (litteraires et musiaux) qui tantôt se suédaient par interférenes, tantôt se mêlaient l un à l autre. C. F. Ramuz Souvenirs sur Igor Stravinsky (Édition Mermod, Lausanne, 1929) quoted in translation in Vera Stravinsky and Robert Craft, Stravinsky in Pitures and Douments, (New York: Simon and Shuster, 1978),161. Ramuz reated the Frenh translation of Svadebka (Les Noes) for Stravinsky. 6 Igor Stravinsky and Robert Craft, Expositions and Developments (Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, In., 1962), Ukrainian was my fi rst language, and I grew up singing in Churh Slavi at my home hurh. In the ourse of my graduate studies, I gained a faility in Russian as well. As is the ase with many polyglots (and muh to the onsternation of my students and olleagues), I have a prediletion for puns. The use of third person in the body of this artile for referenes to the author refl ets the editorial style of the Choral Journal. 8 V. Stravinsky and R. Craft, Stravinsky in Pitures and Douments, 144. Similarly, Stravinsky/Craft write: Stravinsky s inspiration in his voal works originated in the sounds and rhythms and syllables of words. 9 Piotr Kireevsky ( ). P.V. Kireevsky, Pesni sobrannyia P.V. Kireevskim, novaia seriia (Mosow: Obshhestvo liubitelei rossiisko slovesnosti, 1911). Stravinsky also quotes verses from another olletion: A. V. Tereshhenko, Byt russkogo naroda (St. Petersburg, 1848). Stravinsky desribes the genesis of Svadebka in Expositions and Developments, Kireevsky took are not to standardize words or spelling: Transribe word for word without exeption and without any seletion, in spite of ontent, brevity, awkwardness, and even any apparent lak of sense. For a more omplete disussion of the various verses and their soures, see Roberta Reeder and Arthur Comegno, Stravinsky s Les Noes, Dane Journal 18/2 (Winter ), The following disussion of folk versus urban pronuniation may help horal diretors make hoies of dition for the work as a whole even if they do not wish to delve into the intriaies of Stravinsky s wordplay. 12 Mariinsky Theater: July 11, The passage at Rehearsal 97 to 98 is a partiularly diffi ult passage even for native speakers. 13 For example, at Rehearsal 14, the bass soloist sings tyibye and the tenor soloist sings tyebye. The soloists in the Pokrovsky ensemble also standardize the Russian dition in some plaes, orreting Kireevsky s/ Stravinsky s deliberate misspellings. For 18 CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5

12 In Stravinsky s Svadebka example, at Rehearsal 68, the bass soloist sings svyeha the standard Russian word for andle instead of svyetsa as written in Kireevsky Song #137 and in the sore. Perhaps the soloist or the diretor wish to make the word more immediately intelligible to a modern-russian audiene. Pokrovsky Ensemble, Les Noes, Nonesuh, This is the formal language of the Orthodox Churh also referred to as Churh Slavoni. Many urrent linguists prefer the term Churh Slavi. 15 As is the ase with many languages, spelling hanges only long after pronuniation hanges. 16 Hungaroton reording with the Slovak Philharmoni Chorus, Péter Eötvös onduting. Re-released in 1988 on CD: HCD Western horal diretors sometimes make the mistake of onsulting whatever reent Russian émigré is available, regardless of linguisti expertise, to oah the pronuniation of Svadebka. On oasion, I have observed amateur (if native Russian) dition oahes advise that the horus should sing with a strong urban aent: not kosal but kasal (akanye) and not hesu but heesu (ikanye). 18 Throughout this artile, I adopt mostly the Library of Congress system of transliteration for quotes from Kireevsky and Stravinsky. In the LOC system, the Russian soft sign (ь) is indiated by a single prime symbol ('), as shown here at the end of the word kosal'. Thus, the fi nal sound of the word is a soft, or palatalized, l similar to the sound of ll in the English word million. The LOC system does not always fully refl et the way Russian words are pronouned. For example, the title of the work itself, Свадебка, is transliterated letter-for-letter Svadebka although it is pronouned Svadiebka (or Svadyebka ). The transliteration used in this artile differs from the LOC system in two ways: the letter ы, transliterated as y in the LOC system, is transliterated here as ï. The hard sign (ъ), transliterated as a double-prime ('') in the LOC system, is omitted in our transliteration; it is a letter that has been obsolete sine the early twentieth entury and does not affet pronuniation. 19 Referene here is made to an Amerian song about differenes in pronuniation Lets Call The Whole Thing Off, written by George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin for the 1937 fi lm Shall We Dane. 20 In some reordings or performanes, both modern urban and folk pronuniations are used side-by-side: the soloist adopts one pronuniation while the horus adopts another. 21 The Hungarotone reording hooses o as did the singers in the performane I attended in St. Petersburg at the Mariinsky Theater in July, In Tableau I at Rehearsal 21, Stavinsky adds a syllable to the end of the standard Russian word заплети ( zapleti, meaning plait ) so that it beomes заплетитко ( zapletitko ). The added syllable tko is ommon to folk dialet and folksongs and has no meaning per se but has a softening effet. The added syllable also reinfores the o resonane and the dominane of ko as an elemental syllable in this tableau depiting the kosa. 23 Kireevsky, Song #164e. 24 Kireevsky, Song # Kireevsky Song # Kireevsky, Song # The patronymis Timofeevna and Pamfi levih appear to be Stravinsky s own invention. 28 The name Khvetis is apparently ommon to several regions of southern Russia and Ukraine. Reeder-Comegno, 50. Both the Frenh and English versions of Svadebka simplify the groom s name to Fetis, perhaps sine in those languages Fetis is already unusual and the diffi ulty of pronuniation adds no regional fl avor. 29 The only opportunity for hokanye that Stravinsky passes up is in the word почѣловатъ ( pohielovat' ), whose standard spelling and pronuniation would be поцѣловатъ ( potsielovat', meaning to kiss ). As Reeder notes, this is probably beause, of all of these altered words in Kireevsky s quoted song, pohielovat' would be the least intelligible to the modern listener. At Rehearsal 60, Stravinsky hanges Kireevsky s рожество ( rozhestvo ) to the standard рождество ( rozhdestvo ) probably for the same reason. 30 The olloquial pratie of slurvian, is explored in an artile by William Safi re Yagoddaprollemwiddat? New York Times Magazine, Sept 17, Pokrovsky s reording, for example, applies akanye here: Baslavi. 32 Stravinsky writes of this setion: The two unaompanied basses, however muh their musi may suggest the atual reading of the marriage servie, are not to be identifi ed with two priests. Expositions and Douments, Suh fast speeh with playful rhyme is typial of Russian wedding toasts. 34 See footnote Taruskin, Appendix, Table 4, note for Rehearsal From the sore of the English version: The Wedding (London: J.G.W. Chester/Edition Wilhelm Hansen Ltd., 1922). 37 Les Noes par Igor Strawinsky, version française de C.-F. Ramuz (London: J. & W. Chester, Ltd., 1922). 38 William E. Harkins, The Text of Stravinsky s Les Noes (typeset originally prepared as a ontribution to an unrealized fasimile of skethes and preliminary versions of Svadebka by the Harvard University Press). Mimeograph opy ourtesy of Rihard Taruskin. 39 Reeder/Comegno, Private onversation with Simon Karlinsky at his home in Berkeley, California, January, Theodore Levin and Dmitry Pokrovsky translation from the liner notes to the Pokrovsky Ensemble reording, As Taruskin notes, Stravinsky direts that the fi rst vowel (the so alled è oborotnoye, or bakward E be pronouned not as the standard eta but yeta. This vowel alteration is a ommon way of parodying inebriated speeh. Taruskin Appendix, Table IV, note for Rehearsal Similarly, at Rehearsal 89, the verse sung (to the same melody!) by the basses alters the standard найшолъ ( nayshol ) to нашолъ ( nashol ). This verse, taken from Kireevsky Song #451, might have been a model for Stravinsky s verse. If Kireevsky ould leave out the glide ending of nayshol, Stravinsky ould drop the glide ending of naydut. CHORAL JOURNAL Volume 52 Number 5 19