Movements for Piano and Orchestra

Movements is a 1959 five-movement work for piano and orchestra by Igor Stravinsky lasting about ten minutes. It was written during his serial period and shows his dedication to that idiom as well as the influence of Anton Webern. Commission Stravinsky wrote Movements on a $15,000-commission from a Swiss industrialist for his pianist-wife Margrit Weber, who premiered it at a Stravinsky Festival in New York's Town Hall on January 10, 1960, with the composer conducting. The industrialist had asked for a work of between 15 and 20 minutes in length, but Stravinsky provided a refined and compressed piece lasting barely half as long. Analysis (orchestration: 2 flutes (2nd = piccolo), oboe, English horn, clarinet, bass clarinet, bassoon, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, harp, celesta, strings and solo piano) Stravinsky breaks the orchestra down into chamber-sized sections with the piano acting as a pivot between these, creating the type of subtle and gestural textures favored by Webern in his Concerto for Nine Instruments (Op. 24) and Variations for Orchestra (Op. 30), the latter a work much admired by Stravinsky.