VALDOSTA – Something happened May 29, 1913, when composer Igor Stravinsky debuted “The Rite of Spring” as music for a ballet in Paris.

“That ‘The Rite of Spring’ sparked the most famous riot in music history when it was premiered at the Théatre des Champs-Elysées … has long been the stuff of performing arts lore,” music critic Ted Libbey wrote.

But did the premiere inspire a riot, or merely an outraged response? Were audience members forcibly ejected, or did they simply rise and walk out? Did the new music inspire the shocked reaction, or was it the heavy stomping of the dance choreography, or the combination of the full production? Did angry people spill out into the streets, or did the audience roar its disapproval in the theatre?

Howard Hsu, Valdosta Symphony Orchestra conductor, said something happened during the premiere of “The Rite of Spring,” but it’s almost impossible to parse what actually happened and what has been conflated into legend.

For example, years later, the audience reportedly included Marcel Proust, Pablo Picasso, Gertrude Stein, Maurice Ravel and Claude Debussy. Legend claims French composer Camille Saint-Saens walked out of the theatre. When the uproar became so loud, Sergei Diaghilev, Ballet Russes founder, had to bang on the stage floor so the dancers could keep the time.

Hsu said he tells his music history students that “Stravinsky’s own words are suspect.” Igor Stravinsky understood hype. “He knew how to put something out there.”

Hsu said he doesn’t expect a riot when the Valdosta Symphony performs “The Rite of Spring” March 29 in Whitehead Auditorium at Valdosta State University but the audience should come expecting to hear something different. The composition can still be startling, even 112 years after its premiere.

“Rite” requires an orchestra of about 100 musicians packed onto the Whitehead stage. The VSO hasn’t staged an orchestra this large since performing Mahler’s Sixth Symphony in 2019, but the Sixth number included a large chorus.

Stravinsky takes this large orchestra and pushes the instruments to points nearly beyond their range.

“He exploits what they can do and has them doing things they don’t normally do,” Hsu said. Recent generations of musicians have been trained performing music by composers influenced by “Rite” but “at the time, the musicians must have looked at what Stravinsky was demanding and initially thought, um, no.”

“Rite” is a century old but “to a lot of people,” Hsu said, “it will seem new. … He placed the emphasis more on rhythms than melody. He opened up a new world of sound.”

Stravinsky explored some of these sound ideas with his earlier work, “Petrushka” (1911) “but not to these levels,” Hsu said. “‘Petrushka’ still had a center and now (with ‘Rite’) that center is not there. he’s not giving us that center any more and if you’re disoriented, well, too bad. That’s what we’re going for.”

With a nearly 100-piece orchestra, the music often pounds through the auditorium.

“The audience will not only hear it but will feel it,” Hsu said. “You can feel it in your gut and it will ring in your ears.

“It’s loud but then so quiet.”

“The Rite of Spring” can take even modern audiences by surprise. The music defies expectation. Hsu said that’s likely what startled the Parisian audience in 1913.

Think of Bob Dylan playing the Newport Folk Festival in 1965. The audience came expecting to hear Dylan playing the traditional acoustic folk guitar. Instead, he “went electric,” using an electric guitar and amplifier. The audience became upset because Dylan defied expectations.

In 1913, the audience expected a traditional ballet performed to a traditional music composition.

Stravinsky upset expectations and forever changed the nature of music.