I'd never seen the
music video for
Intergalactic by the
Beastie Boys until roughly 5 minutes ago. Hell, I'd seen
parts of it, but not the whole thing.
As such I was shocked and not a little
amused to find that in the theatrical
segment at the beginning of the video, the
orchestral music being sampled is an excerpt from
Igor Stravinsky's
Le Sacre Du Printemps. This is funny and yet, at the same time I know that my
homeslice Igor is
spinning in his grave.
Stravinsky had this thing. It was an obsessive need to preserve the original
intent and interpretation of his music. He was one of the earliest
composers to insist on
gramophone recordings of his work both in full score and piano condensed versions. He wanted there to be
no mistake as to how he wanted his music to sound when it was played after his death or by other people, and he was intensely
afraid of his music being used for purposes other than for what it was originally intended.
So, a great piece of
music written by someone extra-
paranoid about its legacy is now prominently featured along side
a giant, breakdancing robot.Trust me, this is all simply
awash in
comic irony.