Igor Stravinsky was just finishing The Firebird when he had a vision of a “solemn pagan rite: sage elders seated in a circle, watch a young girl dance herself to death.” The artist Nicholas Roerich had a similar vision. The impresario Sergei Diaghilev teamed them up with the young choreographer Vaslav Nijinsky, and Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring) premiered on May 29, 1913, wreaking havoc. The critic Jacques Rivière called it a “biological ballet … spring seen from the inside, with its violence, its spasms and its fissions.” Another witness said, “The composer has written a score that we shall not be ready for until 1940.” Indeed, many would say the music foretold the slaughter of W.W. I, which began in 1914. Count Harry Kessler described the performance on opening night as “a new kind of wildness, both un-art and art at the same time.” Prom 63 begins with a dramatic and musical exploration of Stravinsky’s groundbreaking work, and concludes with a performance of it, conducted by heart by Nicholas Collon. —Laura Jacobs