[Aidevah]

The main reason for the commotion during the Paris premiere seems to be the publicity which whipped up the audience on both sides and made a clash inevitable. The Russian ballet had been playing the snobbery of the Paris audience for Stravinsky's two previous ballets, but misjudged the response in the third.

The subsequent performances, the London premiere, and the Paris concert premiere in 1914 all went off without a hitch. And the status of the Rite has only steadily increased ever since.

As Taruskin says, the music of the Rite is actually not very difficult to appreciate[1]:

> While it was at first a sore test for orchestra and conductor, and while it took fully half a century before music analysts caught up with it, The Rite has never been a difficult piece for the audience.

> The sounds of the music make a direct and compelling appeal to the listener’s imagination, and the listener’s body. In conjunction with Stravinsky’s peerless handling of the immense orchestra they have a visceral, cathartic impact. They leave—and to judge from the history of the score’s reception, have always left—most listeners feeling exhilarated. It is only the mythology of The Rite that would suggest anything else.

[1] https://avant.edu.pl/wp-content/uploads/Richard-Taruskin-Res...