There is a reactionary conservative side of classical music, which is not the most exciting side of it. The side that draws me in, there's a real encouragement of risk-taking, going back to masters of that tradition like Beethoven and Bartok and Stravinsky.
Bryce Dessner
Even Stravinsky does not evoke the same public affection as Verdi.
Charles Rosen
Bernard Herrmann used to write all his scores by himself. So did Bach, Beethoven and Stravinsky. I don't understand why this happens in the movie industry.
Ennio Morricone
Pulse as an active means of expression, Stravinsky and Beethoven are the two masters of that.
Esa-Pekka Salonen
Stravinsky is masterly: his harmony is conceived so precisely that it can only be the way it is.
I've learned a lot from the masters of orchestration, like Ravel and Stravinsky.
I looked like Brigitte Bardot, and I was Stravinsky's goddaughter.
Eve Babitz
Stravinsky used Mother Goose. He was influenced by Mother Goose, indirectly, but very beautifully.
Gyorgy Ligeti
Stravinsky influenced film music in general - those stabbing chords and rhythms from 'The Rite of Spring.'
Henry Mancini
It's something he used to say when he was happy. It could be a very, very simple day. We might be sitting out on the front lawn. Dad loved classical music and we might be listening to some Stravinsky or something and having some tea and eggs. And he'd say, 'Oh, good stuff, isn't it?'
Jennifer Grant
'Canticum Sacrum' is wonderfully archaic. What Stravinsky does is extraordinary. It takes you on a journey from Gregorian chant right through to the modernism of Webern - and all in 17 minutes.
John Tavener
I loved Debussy, Stravinsky, Chopin, Tchaikovsky, anything with romantic melodies, especially the nocturnes. Nietzsche was a hero, especially with 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra.' He gets a bad rap; he's very misunderstood. He's a maker of individuals, and he was a teacher of teachers.
Joni Mitchell
I started with very tonal 19th-century music because I wanted to be a violinist as a child. So this was my first music, and then I was very much influenced by Stravinsky and Shostakovich in the 1950s. But I was starting to develop my own style.
Krzysztof Penderecki
The first music I was exposed to was Stravinsky and I loved it but I don't remember it.
Leo Kottke
The fact that Stravinsky used the classics as a major influence is obvious. What is interesting is how he used them, how he turned Bach into Stravinsky.
Lukas Foss
The cubism of Braque or Picasso, the dissonant compositions of Schoenberg or Stravinsky, the free-flowing and often erotic choreography of Isadora Duncan and Nijinsky - these were acts of rebellion against the certainties and traditions of the old world.
Margaret MacMillan
There is this tremendous amount of arrogance and hubris, where somebody can look at something for five minutes and dismiss it. Whether you talk about gaming or 20th century classical music, you can't do it in five minutes. You can't listen to 'The Rite of Spring' once and understand what Stravinsky was all about.
Penn Jillette
I've had little success in intellectual circles. I'm not talked about in the 'New York Review of Books,' and I was never part of the Stravinsky 'inner circle.'
Samuel Barber
I got thrown out of music school for even listening to Fats Domino and Ray Charles. I was asked, 'What kind of music do you like to listen to?' and I said, 'Well, I do like Paul Hindemith and Igor Stravinsky but I also like Fats Domino and Ray Charles,' and they literally said, 'Either forget about that or leave.'
Steve Winwood
On my mental iPod, I always have Stravinsky and Ravel.
Steven Stucky
No, I don't know how to get young people to start listening to jazz again. But I do know this: Any symphony orchestra that thinks it can appeal to under-30 listeners by suggesting that they 'should' like Schubert and Stravinsky has already lost the battle.
