Rimsky-Korsakov gave him instruction in sonata writing, and set him orchestration exercises based on his own opera. It was all this hard work that eventually led to one of Stravinsky's first public performance of his first work, a Piano Sonata in F#, at Rimsky-Korsakov's house (Stravinsky 21). .
During 1909,Stravinsky conducted another public performance at St Petersburg. Among the audience was the impresario Serge Diaghilev. He was greatly impressed by the creativity of Stravinsky, using the very limited material available to him. A year later he was invited to write the music for a ballet based on the Russian folktale of the Firebird (Griffith 14). The story was that a princess had a bird, which she called the 'Firebird', because of its magnificent colors. It got stolen so everyone in the palace was miserable, but then it was returned again and everyone was happy. Not one of the best storylines, but this for Stravinsky was the first of his large-scale commission and he exerted himself totally in writing a novel piece. This piece was later to cause the change in his career direction so radically that he could not have imagined it at any time - when Diaghilev invited him to join his company and work in Paris (Griffiths 15). Stravinsky went with the company to Paris in 1910 and spent much of his time in France from then onwards, continuing his association with Diaghilev in Petrushka (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913). These scores showed an extraordinary development. Both of them used old Russian folk tunes. These Russian folk tunes influenced many of Stravinsky's coming works and made them a key part of his compositions ("On Point"). .
Stravinsky's productive periods never seemed to last long, and a few years down the line they were interrupted by the outbreak of the First World War. Stravinsky had occasionally taken short trips to Switzerland between 1910 and 1920. As Russia and Germany, where most of his publishers were, were behind enemy lines, he was no longer able to publish or depend on his Russian estate for income, hence he found himself extremely strained financially.