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Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky
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Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky was born on April 28, 1840, in Votinsk, where his father, who
was a mining engineer, had been appointed inspector of the mines
at Kamsko-Votinsk. The position of manager of such important mines
carried with it much luxury, a fine house, plenty of servants and an
ample salary. Thus the future young musician's home life was not one
of poverty and privation, as has been the lot of so many gifted ones,
who became creators in the beautiful art of music.
Peter Ilyich was less than five years old when a new governess came
into the family, to teach his elder brother Nicholas and his cousin
Lydia. As a little boy he was apt to be untidy, with buttons missing
and rumpled hair. But his nature was so affectionate and sympathetic
that he charmed every one with his pretty, loving ways. This natural
gift he always retained. The governess was a very superior person and
her influence over her young charges was healthful and beneficial. The
child Peter was most industrious at his lessons; but for recreation
often preferred playing the piano, reading, or writing poetry, to
playing with other children.
When Peter was eight, the family moved to St. Petersburg, and the two
younger boys were sent to boarding school. The parting from his home
but especially from his mother--though he saw her once a week--nearly
broke his heart. Such a school was no place for a sensitive,
high-strung boy like Peter, who needed the most tender fostering care.
The work of the school was very heavy, the hours long. The boys often
sat over their books till far into the night. Besides the school
work, Peter had music lessons of the pianist Philipov, and made rapid
progress. At this time music in general excited the boy abnormally;
a hand organ in the street would enchant him, an orchestra strangely
agitated him. He seemed to live at a high strung, nervous tension, and
had frequent ailments, which kept him out of school.
In 1849 the father secured another appointment, this time at Alapaiev,
a little town, where, though there was not so much luxury, the family
tried to revive the home life of Votinsk.
No one at Alapaiev seemed to take any interest in the boy Peter's
music. He was really making great progress, for he had learned much in
the lessons he had taken in St. Petersburg. He studied many pieces by
himself, and often improvised at the piano. His parents did nothing
to further his musical education; this may have been because they
were afraid of a return of the nervous disorders that the quiet of the
present home surroundings had seemed to cure.
From the fact that the father had held government appointments, his
sons were eligible for education at the School of Jurisprudence. Peter
was accordingly entered there as a scholar, and completed his course
at the age of nineteen. In those nine years the child Peter developed
into maturity. During this period he suffered the loss of his mother,
a handsome and very estimable woman, whom he adored with passionate
devotion, and from whom he could never bear to be separated.
While attending the Law School, music had to be left in the
background. His family and companions only considered it as a pastime
at best, and without serious significance; he therefore kept his
aspirations to himself. The old boyish discontent and irritability,
which were the result of his former nervous condition, had now given
place to his natural frankness of character and charm of manner, which
attracted all who came in contact with him.
In 1859, when Peter had finished his studies at the School of
Jurisprudence, he received an appointment in the Ministry of Justice,
as clerk of the first class. This would have meant much to some young
men, but did not greatly impress Peter, as he did not seem to take his
work very seriously. During the three years in which he held the post,
he followed the fashion of the day, attended the opera and theater,
meanwhile receiving many impressions which molded his character and
tastes. The opera "Don Giovanni," Mozart's masterpiece, made a deep
impression upon him, also the acting of Adelaide Ristori and the
singing of Lagrona.
The new Conservatoire of Music was founded at St. Petersburg in 1862,
with Anton Rubinstein as director, and Tchaikovsky lost no time in
entering as a pupil, studying composition and kindred subjects with
Professor Zaremba. His progress was so rapid in the several branches
he took up--piano, organ and flute--that Rubinstein advised him to
make music his profession, and throw his law studies to the winds.
Thanks to Rubinstein, he secured some pupils and also engagements as
accompanist. Meanwhile he worked industriously at composition, and one
of his pieces was a Concert Overture in F, scored for small orchestra.
In 1865 he took his diploma as a musician and also secured a silver
medal for a cantata. One year after this the Moscow Conservatoire
was founded, with Nicholas Rubinstein at its head. The position
of Professor of Composition and Musical History was offered to
Tchaikovsky, then only twenty-six. It was a flattering offer for so
young a man, when many older heads would have liked to secure such
an honor. He moved to Moscow, and retained his position in the
Conservatoire for at least twelve years, in the meantime making many
friends for himself and his art, as his fame as a composer grew. One
of these friends was the publisher Jurgenson, who was to play rather
an important part in the composer's life, through accepting and
putting forth his compositions.
During those first years in Moscow, Tchaikovsky made his home with
Nicholas Rubinstein. His life was of the simplest, his fare always so.
Later on when money was more abundant, and he had his own house in the
country, he lived with just the same simplicity. One would think that
all this care and thought for expense would have taught him the value
of money. Not at all. He never could seem to learn its value, never
cared for it, and never could keep it. He liked to toss his small
change among groups of street boys, and it is said he once spent his
last roubles in sending a cablegram to von Bülow in America, to thank
him for his admirable performance of his first Piano Concerto. Often
his friends protested against this prodigality, but it was no use to
protest, and at last they gave up in despair.
Soon after he began his professorship in Moscow, he composed a Concert
Overture in C minor. To his surprise and disappointment, Rubinstein
disapproved of the work in every way. This was a shock, after the lack
of encouragement in St. Petersburg. But he recovered his poise, though
he made up his mind to try his next work in St. Petersburg instead of
Moscow. He called the new piece a Symphonic Poem, "Winter Daydreams,"
but it is now known as the First Symphony, Op. 13. About the end of
1866, he started out with it, only to be again rebuffed and cast down.
The two men whose good opinion he most desired, Anton Rubinstein and
Professor Zaremba, could find nothing good in his latest work, and
the young composer returned to Moscow to console himself with renewed
efforts in composition. Two years later the "Winter Daydreams"
Symphony was produced in Moscow with great success, and its author
was much encouraged by this appreciation. He was, like most composers,
very sensitive to criticism and had a perfect dread of controversy.
Efforts to engage him in arguments of this sort only made him withdraw
into himself.
Tchaikovsky held the operas of Mozart before him as his ideal. He
cared little for Wagner, considering his music dramas to be built on
false principles. Thus his first opera, "Voivoda," composed in 1866,
evidently had his ideal, Mozart, clearly in mind. It is a somewhat
curious fact that Tschaikowsky, who was almost revolutionary in other
forms of music, should go back to the eighteenth century for his ideal
of opera. Soon after it was completed "Voivoda" was accepted to be
produced at the Moscow Grand Theater. The libretto was written by
Ostrowsky, one of the celebrated dramatists of the day. The first
performance took place on January 30, 1869. We are told it had several
performances and considerable popular success. But the composer was
dissatisfied with its failure to win a great artistic success, and
burnt the score. He did the same with his next work, an orchestral
fantaisie, entitled "Fatum." Again he did the same with the score of
a complete opera, "Undine," finished in 1870, and refused at the St.
Petersburg Opera, where he had offered it.
"The Snow Queen," a fairy play with music, was the young Russian's
next adventure; it was mounted and produced with great care, yet it
failed to make a favorable impression. But these disappointments did
not dampen the composer's ardor for work. Now it was in the realm of
chamber music. Up to this time he had not seemed to care greatly
for this branch of his art, for he had always felt the lack of tone
coloring and variety in the strings. The first attempt at a String
Quartet resulted in the one in D major, Op. 11. To-day, fifty years
after, we enjoy the rich coloring, the characteristic rhythms of this
music; the Andante indeed makes special appeal. A bit of history about
this same Andante shows how the composer prized national themes and
folk tunes, and strove to secure them. It is said that morning after
morning he was awakened by the singing of a laborer, working on the
house below his window. The song had a haunting lilt, and Tschaikowsky
wrote it down. The melody afterwards became that touching air which
fills the Andante of the First String Quartet. Another String Quartet,
in F major, was written in 1814, and at once acclaimed by all who
heard it, with the single exception of Anton Rubinstein.
Tchaikovsky wrote six Symphonies in all. The Second, in C minor
was composed in 1873; in this he used themes in the first and last
movements, which were gathered in Little Russia. The work was produced
with great success in Moscow in 1873. The next orchestral composition
was a Symphonic Poem, called "The Tempest," with a regular program,
prepared by Stassow. It was brought out in Paris at the same time
it was heard in Moscow. Both at home and in France it made a deep
impression. The next work was the splendid piano Concerto in B flat
minor, Op. 23, the first of three works of this kind. At a trial
performance of it, his friend and former master, Nicholas Rubinstein,
to whom it was dedicated, and who had promised to play the piano part,
began to criticize it unmercifully and ended by saying it was quite
unplayable, and unsuited to the piano.
No one could blame the composer for being offended and hurt. He at
once erased the name of Nicholas Rubinstein from the title page and
dedicated the work to Hans von Billow, who not long after performed
it with tremendous success in America, where he was on tour. When we
think of all the pianists who have won acclaim in this temperamental,
inspiring work, from Carreno to Percy Grainger, to mention two who
have aroused special enthusiasm by their thrilling performance of it,
we can but wonder that his own countrymen were so short sighted at
the time it was composed. Later on Nicholas Rubinstein gave a superb
performance of the Concerto in Moscow, thus making some tardy amends
for his unkindness.
Tchaikovsky was now thirty-five. Most of his time was given to the
Conservatoire, where he often worked nine hours a day. Besides, he had
written a book on harmony, and was contributing articles on music to
two journals. In composition he had produced large works, including
up to this time, two Symphonies, two Operas, the Concerto, two String
Quartets and numerous smaller pieces. To accomplish such an amount
of work, he must have possessed immense energy and devotion to his
ideals.
One of the operas just mentioned was entitled "Vakoula the Smith."
It bears the date of 1874, and was first offered in competition with
others. The result was that it not only was considered much the
best work of them all but it won both the first and second prizes.
"Vakoula" was splendidly mounted and performed in St. Petersburg, at
the Marinsky Theater at least seventeen times. Ten years later, in
January 1887, it appeared again. The composer meanwhile had re-written
a good part of it and now called it "Two Little Shoes." This time
Tchaikovsky was invited to conduct his own work. The invitation
filled him with alarm, for he felt he had no gift in that direction,
as he had tried a couple of times in the early years of his career and
had utterly failed. However, he now, through the cordial sympathy of
friends, decided to make the attempt. Contrary to his own fears, he
obtained a successful performance of the opera.
It proved an epoch-making occasion. For this first success as
conductor led him to undertake a three months' tour through western
Europe in 1888. On his return to St. Petersburg he conducted a program
of his own compositions for the Philharmonic Society, which was
also successful, in spite of the intense nervousness which he always
suffered. As a result of his concert he received offers to conduct
concerts in Hamburg, Dresden, Leipsic, Vienna, Copenhagen and London,
many of which he accepted.
To go back a bit in our composer's life story, to an affair of
the heart which he experienced in 1868. He became engaged to the
well-known singer Désirée Artôt; the affair never went further, for
what reason is not known. He was not yet thirty, impressionable and
intense. Later on, in the year 1877, at the age of thirty-seven, he
became a married man. How this happened was doubtless told in his
diaries, which were written with great regularity: but unfortunately
he destroyed them all a few years before his death. The few facts that
have been gleaned from his intimate friend, M. Kashkin, are that he
was engaged to the lady in the spring of this year, and married her
a month or so afterward. It was evidently a hasty affair and
subsequently brought untold suffering to the composer. When
the professors of his Conservatoire re-assembled in the autumn,
Tschaikowsky appeared among them a married man, but looking the
picture of despair. A few weeks later he fled from Moscow, and when
next heard of was lying dangerously ill in St. Petersburg. One thing
was evident, the ill-considered marriage came very near ruining his
life. The doctors ordered rest and change of scene, and his brother
Modeste Ilyitch took him to Switzerland and afterward to Italy. The
peaceful life and change of scene did much to restore his shattered
nerves. Just at this time a wealthy widow lady, Madame von Meek, a
great admirer of Tschaikowsky's music, learning of his sad condition,
settled on him a generous yearly allowance for life. He was now
independent and could give his time to composition.
The following year he returned to Moscow and seemed quite his natural
self. A fever of energy for work took possession of him. He began a
new opera, "Eugen Onégin," and completed his Fourth Symphony, in F
minor. The score of the opera was finished in February, 1878, and
sent at once to Moscow, where the first performance was given in March
1879. In the beginning the opera had only a moderate success, but
gradually grew in favor till, after five years, it was performed
in St. Petersburg and had an excellent reception. It is considered
Tschaikowsky's most successful opera, sharing with Glinka's "Life of
the Tsar" the popularity of Russian opera. In 1881 he was invited
to compose an orchestral work for the consecration of the Temple of
Christ in Moscow. The "Solemn Overture 1812," Op. 49, was the outcome
of this. Later in the year he completed the Second Piano Concerto.
The Piano Trio in A minor, "To the memory of a great artist," Op.
50, refers to his friend and former master, Nicholas Rubinstein, who
passed away in Paris, in 1881.
Tchaikovsky's opera, "Mazeppa," was his next important work. In the
same year the Second Orchestral Suite, Op. 53, and the Third, Op. 55,
followed. Two Symphonic Poems, "Manfred" and "Hamlet" came next. The
latter of these was written at the composer's country house, whose
purchase had been made possible by the generosity of his benefactress,
and to which he retired at the age of forty-five, to lead a peaceful
country life. He had purchased the old manor house of Frovolo, on the
outskirts of the town of Klin, near Moscow. Here his two beautiful
ballets and two greatest Symphonies, the Fifth and Sixth, were
written. The Fifth Symphony was composed in 1888 and published the
next year. On its first hearing it made little impression and was
scarcely heard again till Nikisch, with unerring judgment, rescued it
from neglect; then the world discovered it to be one of the composer's
greatest works.
Tchaikovsky's two last operas, the "Pique Dame" (Queen of Spades),
Op. 68, and "King Rene's Daughter" are not considered in any way
distinctive, although the former was performed in New York, at the
Metropolitan. The Third Piano Concerto, Op. 75, occupied the master
during his last days at Frovolo; it was left unfinished by him and was
completed by the composer Taneiev. The wonderful Sixth Symphony, Op.
74, is a superb example of Tchaikovsky's genius. It was composed in
1893, and the title "Pathetic" was given it by the composer after its
first performance, in St. Petersburg, shortly before his death, as the
reception of it by the public did not meet his anticipations. In this
work the passion and despair which fill so many of the master's
finest compositions, rise to the highest tragic significance. The
last movement, with its prophetic intimation of his coming death, is
heart-breaking. One cannot listen to its poignant phrases without
deep emotion. The score is dated August 81, 1893. On October 12,
Tchaikovsky died in St. Petersburg, a victim of cholera.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Facts and Information
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