First performed by the Ballets Russes in Paris in 1923, with choreography by Bronislava Nijinska, Les Noces (The Wedding) was reputedly Stravinsky’s favourite of all his works. By any standard, it’s one of his greatest, most startlingly original creations, as much of a landmark in 20th-century modernism as the more celebrated Rite of Spring, but it was a score that took 10 years to reach the form in which it’s usually heard today – the singers accompanied by untuned and tuned percussion, including a quartet of pianos.
