Stravinsky: Chronicle of a Friendship

For the last twenty-three years of Igor Stravinsky’s incredibly full life, the noted musician, conductor, and writer Robert Craft was his closest colleague and friend, a trusted member of the Stravinsky household, and an important participant in virtually all of the composer’s worldwide activities. Throughout these years, Craft kept a detailed diary, impressive in its powers of observation and characterization. This diary forms the basis for Stravinsky: Chronicle of a Friendship, now released in this substantially revised and enlarged edition. The original edition of this classic memoir has long been out of print. This new revised edition extends the material by more than a third. The text now includes several previously unpublished and historically important letters from prominent musicians, including Arnold Schoenberg, Luigi Dallapiccola, and Glenn Gould. More than fifty photographs and drawings (fourteen in color), most of them previously unpublished, illustrate the new edition. Each of the first twenty-three chapter-years now ends with a Postscript that provides supplementary information and a reflective connecting thread to the text. Craft has also added a Postlude in which he shares important moments of his friendship with Vera Stravinsky during the last years of her life. The whole Chronicle offers both a personal testament and an expansive embrace of the author’s world.