ABSTRACT
This chapter's survey of theatrical huntsmen, soldiers and shepherds highlights the dysphoric states of Stravinsky's topics. Raymond Monelle's work on musical topics draws an important distinction between topics employed in their euphoric and dysphoric states. Richard Taruskin associates this dysphoric syntax, honed to perfection in TheRite of spring, with the aesthetic primitivism of stikhiya: a dialect of 'elemental or natural dynamism'. The chapter offers a brief counter, prompted by Monelle's study of the hunt, military and pastoral topics. Marching briefly into the theatre ambulant of Stravinsky's the Soldier's Tale, one encounter a different kind of dysphoric state in the military topics on parade in the opening 'Soldier's March'. The strains of the shepherd's pipe–drifting dysphorically from the C-B seventh drone of The Soldier's Tale 'Pastorale'–diverts the authors' attention to the bucolic repose of Stravinsky's shepherds.
