Les noces

About the show

Les noces (The Wedding, or Svadebka (Свадебка)), is a Russian-language ballet-cantata by Igor Stravinsky scored unusually for four vocal soloists, chorus, percussion and four pianos. Dedicating the work to impresario Sergei Diaghilev, the composer described it in French as "choreographed Russian scenes with singing and music" [sic], and it remains known by its French name of Les noces despite being Russian. Les noces was completed in 1917 but was then subjected to a series of changes of heart by Stravinsky regarding its scoring; he settled on the above forces only in 1923, in time for the premiere in Paris on 13 June that year under conductor Ernest Ansermet and danced by the Ballets Russes to choreography by Bronislava Nijinska. Several versions of the score have been performed over the years, substituting an orchestra for the percussion and pianos or using pianolas in accordance with a version Stravinsky abandoned.