Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

            By 1880 Tchaikovsky, at the age of 40, was a mature, successful composer who was achieving wide recognition for his talents. By then he had completed his first four symphonies, his violin concerto, and his opera, Eugene Onegin, to just mention a few of his significant works.  At the same time, his life, personal and...

            The story is depressingly familiar:  In 1876 the Christians and the Muslims were slaughtering each other in a war between the Turks of the Ottoman Empire and the Slavs of Serbia.  Plus ça change.  Naturally, Russia supported its fellow Slavs, and in the general patriotic fervor, Tchaikovsky was commissioned by the...

          Most probably, no composer other than Beethoven has enjoyed the popularity in this country of that of Pyotr Tchaikovsky.  His reputation has been secure since his early maturity, and yet, it is equally true that no other major modern composer has endured the distortions and indignities as that imposed upon his personality and personal...

          Even a cursory review of the lives of most of the significant composers of the nineteenth century–from Berlioz to Verdi–shows them to have been fascinated with the timeless art of Shakespeare.  In fact, it is a major trait of Romanticism as an intellectual movement to have plumbed the depths of his work for archetypes of the...

            Tchaikovsky’s last three symphonies, two of his solo concertos, Romeo and Juliet, and Swan Lake are surely mainstays of the traditional and popular symphonic repertoire, whose inimitable melodies no doubt most come to mind to music lovers everywhere.  To this must be added the American contemporary mania for his ballet, The...

The symphonies of Tchaikovsky clearly stand in the center of nineteenth-century orchestral repertoire.  Beloved by audiences and musicians alike for more than a century, they were embraced enthusiastically from the onset.  To be sure, there was a time when some commonly scoffed at what they perceived as the composer’s emotional theatrics and shallow playing to the cheap seats.  Thankfully, that...

The symphonies of Tchaikovsky clearly stand in the center of nineteenth-century orchestral repertoire.  Beloved by audiences and musicians alike for more than a century, they were embraced enthusiastically from the onset.  To be sure, there was a time when some commonly scoffed at what they perceived as the composer’s emotional theatrics and shallow playing to the cheap seats.  Thankfully, that...

          Tchaikovsky completed six symphonies, of which the last three are concert staples.  The fourth is a product of a particularly tumultuous time in his life, centering around his relationship with two women.   They are the wife of his short, disastrous marriage, and his patroness—whom he never personally met.   He began...

            Tchaikovsky completed six symphonies during his lifetime, the last three of which have long been concert staples.  The three, while exhibiting both the tangible and intangible characteristics of the composer that endear him to music lovers everywhere, are each unique expressions of his musicianship and personality. ...

            This symphony is Tchaikovsky’s last work—he died of cholera only nine days after its première—and it is universally hailed as one of his finest.  It exhibits all of the characteristic passion and melodic beauty for which the composer justly is known, and is suffused with a dark and tragic essence.  Tchaikovsky struggled...