Why is tchaikovsky important

Tchaikovsky then enrolled in the Saint Petersburg Conservatory shortly after it opened, where he studied music and his reputation as an accomplished composer steadily grew. During his life he experienced many personal difficulties which led him to periods of considerable depression, and he died shortly after finishing his sixth and arguably most well-known symphony. Tchaikovsky's ability to pair the traditions of Western music with Russian themes influenced many composers.

Most notably he had a great influence on fellow Russian composer Igor Stravinsky, who first saw a performance of Tchaikovksy's ballet The Sleeping Beauty at the age of eight.

You can hear his influence in works such as Stravsinky's own ballet The Fairy's Kiss , which uses many themes from Tchaikovsky's early compositions. His determination that the music should be held in the same esteem as the ballet itself was controversial at the time, but it is now the quality that they are most loved for. This decision coincided with the onset of financial hardships for his father Ilya , who by this time had retired from the directorship of the Technological Institute.

In order to support himself, Tchaikovsky began giving private lessons in piano and music theory to students recommended to him by Anton Rubinstein. Tchaikovsky spent almost three years of his life at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory. In addition to his studies of harmony, strict counterpoint, composition and instrumentation and despite having been excused from the compulsory piano class , he also decided to study the flute and organ.

The leading spirits of the conservatory from its beginnings were Nikolay Zaremba and Anton Rubinstein. Despite Tchaikovsky's enthusiasm for learning, he considered Zaremba just an average instructor, whose dislike of Mozart and Glinka greatly disappointed him, and whose admiration for Beethoven and Mendelssohn the future composer found unbearable.

There is no doubt that from the start the main attraction of the newly-founded conservatory for Tchaikovsky was its director Anton Rubinstein , who seems to have had the power to stimulate his student's innate abilities, so that Tchaikovsky soon threw off the last traces of dilettantism in pursuit of his goal to become a good composer. Tchaikovsky never worked so hard as in those years: he faithfully fulfilled his technical assignments, instrumental studies, and tried to master the art of conducting.

Always in the company of his new friend Herman Laroche , a fellow student who would become the first critic to champion Tchaikovsky's music, the two friends attended concerts and operas. Together they made many important connections in Saint Petersburg 's music circles, including Aleksandr Serov , an ideological opponent of Rubinstein , but the composer of the opera Judith , which Tchaikovsky admired.

Tchaikovsky spent the summer of at Aleksey Apukhtin 's estate in Pavlodar. The next summer he stayed at the home of his society friend Prince Aleksey Golitsyn at Trostinets , near Kharkov. Tchaikovsky also sketched out a program for a descriptive concert overture.

Upon completing the score, Tchaikovsky first sent it to Herman Laroche with instructions to pass it on to Anton Rubinstein. For Tchaikovsky the idea of taking the overture to Rubinstein was still uncomfortable: his adoration for his eminent teacher was fraught with fear. This served him well, for it was the hapless Laroche who received the full force of Rubinstein 's anger. Here he found not the expected classical exercise, but a remarkably powerful work: a mature attempt at dramatic program music after the programmatic overtures of Henri Litolff , which not only incorporated a Russian folk song, but was scored for an orchestra that included some instruments "forbidden" to mere students, such as the harp, English Horn and tuba [10].

Tchaikovsky was not discouraged by this, which was to be the first of many such incidents with Rubinstein. Theirs was always an uneasy relationship. This task did not spoil Tchaikovsky's happy vacation spent with his younger brothers Anatoly and Modest on the Davydov family estate at Kamenka , and Rubinstein proved to be quite pleased with the completed translation, which was published by Jurgenson in as Handbook for Instrumentation.

While at Kamenka , Tchaikovsky paid close attention to Ukrainian folk songs, gathering material for use in his future compositions. Soon after his return to Saint Petersburg he was extremely pleased to learn that his Characteristic Dances for orchestra, written earlier that year, had been conducted in August by Johann Strauss the younger at a concert in Pavlovsk Park. This was the first public performance of any of Tchaikovsky's works [11].

Two weeks earlier his String Quartet in B-flat major was played by a quartet of his fellow students, including the violist Vasily Bessel. This was not Tchaikovsky's choice, but Anton Rubinstein 's. According to Tchaikovsky's first biographer, his brother Modest , the young composer was too afraid to attend the public examination, much to Rubinstein 's annoyance.

But the examination commission's records, preserved in the archives of the conservatory, insist that "all students were present" [12]. Still, Rubinstein threatened to withhold Tchaikovsky's diploma and refused to countenance public performance of the cantata unless it were revised.

A number of musical celebrities who were present at the concert, among them Serov and Cui , also disliked it. However, the final verdict on Tchaikovsky was very favourable and two days later he was graduated from the Conservatory. His grades were reported as: theory and instrumentation—excellent; organ—good; piano—very good; conducting—satisfactory. To Tchaikovsky's surprise, he also received the silver medal which since the gold medal was not awarded at that time happened to be the highest award offered to students.

In September , Anton Rubinstein 's brother Nikolay offered Tchaikovsky the post of teacher later professor of harmony in the classes sponsored by the Moscow branch of the Russian Musical Society, which would shortly become the Moscow Conservatory under Nikolay Rubinstein 's directorship. Tchaikovsky found teaching rather a strain, but Nikolay Rubinstein 's constant enthusiasm and encouragement were to have the most palliative effect on him.

He began to work on his First Symphony , but found this a far from simple matter: he was unable to sleep and suffered from terrible headaches and depression. At the end of November, his Symphony No. Nikolay Rubinstein had offered to give the work its first performance, but Tchaikovsky refused because he wanted first to hear the opinions of Zaremba and Anton Rubinstein from Saint Petersburg.

Apparently they did not like the symphony, and it was only after revisions had been made and two movements were tried out in separate performances, that the complete symphony was heard for the first time in February with Nikolay Rubinstein conducting.

In March Tchaikovsky started to work on an opera The Voyevoda to a libretto by the well-known Russian playwright Aleksandr Ostrovsky. Tchaikovsky lost the libretto and, despite Ostrovsky 's efforts to reconstruct it, their collaboration ended in failure, and Tchaikovsky himself completed the libretto on Ostrovsky 's plot [13]. Tchaikovsky spent the summer of in Finland and Estonia, where he composed a set of piano pieces Souvenir de Hapsal , Op.

After returning to Moscow , he continued to work on The Voyevoda , and in February he was invited to conduct some extracts from it at a charity concert. Music from The Voyevoda was well received, even by the "Mighty Handful," who were making their presence known in Russian composition at that time.

Later that spring Tchaikovsky went to Saint Petersburg , where he met members of the "Mighty Handful" personally, and also visited the composer Aleksandr Dargomyzhsky. In January he became friendly with the self-appointed leader of the group, Mily Balakirev , whom he sent a score of his new tone-poem Fatum , which did not meet with Balakirev 's approval.

In the spring of Tchaikovsky made the acquaintance of the actor and baritone Konstantin de Lazari. A companionable socialite, Lazari knew everyone in Moscow theatrical circles, and introduced his new friend to the actors and their milieu.

It was Lazari who brought Tchaikovsky to the club, "the Artistic Circle," where Tchaikovsky enjoyed spending time, and it was he who brought Tchaikovsky to the home of Vladimir Begichev , the director of repertory for the Moscow theatres. Here the young composer was introduced to Begichev 's wife Mariya, and her two sons from her first marriage— Konstantin and Vladimir Shilovsky.

According to Modest Tchaikovsky , "the chief interest for our composer in his acquaintance with the Begichevs lay in the personality of the younger of the Shilovsky brothers, Vladimir. He was then a fourteen-year-old boy, weak and sickly; as a result he had a neglected education, but was endowed, as it seemed then, with a phenomenal capacity for music. In addition, his appearance was unusually lovely, his manners most originally charming and his mind, despite his poor education, sharp and observant" [14].

Vladimir Shilovsky apparently studied music for some time at the Moscow Conservatory and Tchaikovsky came to be his tutor in music theory after that. He was bound to his student not only by Shilovsky 's talent, but also in great measure "by that love verging on adoration which he instilled in the boy" [15]. Though Tchaikovsky's profound attachment to Shilovsky cannot be doubted, the emotional initiative almost always issued from the opposite direction, namely from pupil to teacher.

Initially Tchaikovsky appears to have been delighted with his new young friend, but during the later years of their acquaintance their relations deteriorated, becoming stormy, unpleasant and uncomfortable, full of unpleasant scenes and ruptures as a consequence of Shilovsky 's intractable character. During the —67 season Vladimir Shilovsky 's compositions were already being performed in public concerts and productions, while later he would be commissioned by Tchaikovsky to write an entr'acte to the second act of the latter's opera The Oprichnik.

Shilovsky had not only invited Tchaikovsky to join them but also paid all his travel expenses. It seems that Tchaikovsky enjoyed life in Vladimir Shilovsky 's circle because of their mutual homosexuality. Recent archival studies have revealed the conventional perception of Tchaikovsky as a person tormented by his difference to be unfounded [16]. This perception was based on two largely unsupported assumptions. First, that 19th-century Russia was a society characterized by sexual repression; and second, that as a consequence Tchaikovsky developed a particular fear of exposure and self-hatred.

In fact, the Russia of that period happens to have been a society considerably more permissive than, say, Victorian England.

Russia had no legal ban on homosexuality until Peter the Great in the early 18th century, and even then the ban only extended to the army. Homosexuality was criminalized in by Nicholas I, but the law was virtually never enforced. When matters concerned members of the upper classes, homosexual incidents were covered up by the authorities, the guilty parties, at worst, being transferred from one official position to another. Among Tchaikovsky's contemporaries, one may identify several homosexual members of the Imperial family, the most prominent of them being Grand Duke Sergey Aleksandrovich, governor of Moscow.

One of the most powerful statesmen under the Emperors Alexander III and Nicholas II, Prince Vladimir Meshchersky who was, incidentally, Tchaikovsky's schoolmate and friend was repeatedly rescued by the two Emperors from disgrace despite his flagrant homosexual activities.

One may list many other individuals of similar status in Russian society [17]. The tradition of serfdom, even after the latter was abolished in , continued to exert a powerful effect on social behaviour of both upper and lower classes.

According to established patterns of conduct, socially inferior people were expected to submit to the wishes of the socially superior in every respect, including the gratification of sexual desire. Russian peasants were traditionally tolerant of all varieties of sexual preferences among their masters and were often prepared to satisfy them on demand. This naturally resulted in boundless "sexploitation" which, at the same time, explains the sexual affairs with servants and other lower class persons so characteristic of Tchaikovsky and his milieu—a kind of hierarchical sex [18].

As far as Tchaikovsky's own attitude to his sexual predicament is concerned, he could not of course fully neglect societal convention and, generally speaking, was rather conservative by temperament. In addition, in his youth he was repeatedly pressured to marry, and at some point he conceived the idea that he could change his sexual orientation and successfully live with a woman in order to ease his own life and mollify his relatives. Even at that stage, however, he considered his homosexual tendencies natural and in no way his own fault.

The autumn of was marked for Tchaikovsky with an altogether new amorous development. Ten years later she arrived in Moscow with a mediocre Italian opera company under the direction of Merelli.

It seems that the composer fell in love not so much with her as with her voice and her performance, the more so as she was neither very young, being five years Tchaikovsky's senior, nor exceptionally beautiful, according to some contemporary memoirs. He met her for the first time very briefly in the spring of but her name does not begin to appear in his letters until her autumn performances in Moscow.

He wrote some music for her, and even began to discuss marriage plans with his father. Although he was upset by the news, Tchaikovsky recovered from the disappointment quite quickly, as could be expected. Despite initial success, interest in the opera soon evaporated, and it was withdrawn from the repertoire after only five performances.

Two weeks after the premiere Nikolay Rubinstein conducted the first performance of the symphonic poem Fatum. The public reaction was favourable, but again, as in case of The Voyevoda , this success was short-lived. After Balakirev 's harsh criticism of its Saint Petersburg performance, Tchaikovsky refused to allow the work to be published and, a few years later, destroyed the score.

It was reconstructed after his death on the basis of some discovered orchestral parts. The same fate befell his opera The Voyevoda , from which Tchaikovsky decided to retain only the overture, one chorus, an entr'acte and the dances. Two years later the work was formally rejected and, like its predecessor, consigned to the flames by the composer himself. He saved only four pieces from it which were used later in the Symphony No.

In the autumn of Tchaikovsky met in Moscow with Balakirev , who encouraged the composer to begin a new tone-poem based on Shakespeare 's tragedy Romeo and Juliet. The Russian obsession with love and death, themes that permeate the story of the young lovers from Verona, almost immediately fired Tchaikovsky's imagination.

Tchaikovsky retained a very high opinion of Romeo and Juliet until the end of his life. It is ironic that the tragic situation so well presented by Tchaikovsky in his tone-poem had real-life implications. Fourteen years after the young man's death, Tchaikovsky wrote in his diary: "It seems to me that I have never loved anyone so strongly as him Tchaikovsky's relationships with young men were starting to cause disconcerting talk and gossip in Moscow musical circles, but despite this he continued to pursue his love affairs.

He rushed off to join Vladimir Shilovsky , after the latter fell seriously ill in Paris in , and the two travelled together for some time following Shilovsky 's recuperation. In the autumn of , Tchaikovsky finally rented a small apartment of his own, furnished with a sofa, a few chairs and two pictures one a portrait of Anton Rubinstein , the other of Louis XVII, the dauphin who died in the aftermath of the French Revolution and whom Tchaikovsky had adored from childhood.

He also took on a manservant, Mikhail Sofronov soon to be supplanted by the latter's younger brother Aleksey , a peasant boy from the Klin region near Moscow.

In May he finished his third opera, The Oprichnik adapted from a tragedy by the historical novelist Ivan Lazhechnikov and set during the reign of Ivan the Terrible , and, while staying at Kamenka during the summer, he began work on his Symphony No. Encouraged, Tchaikovsky proceeded to his next project, incidental music for Ostrovsky 's play The Snow Maiden.

The Tempest was a great success at its first performance in Moscow in early December. Despite some initial success, the opera did not convince the composer's critics.

Tchaikovsky found himself agreeing with the critics: " The Oprichnik torments me", he confided to his cousin Anna Merkling [22]. The failure of the opera spoiled his journey to Italy, where he went right after the premiere in his capacity as music critic. He returned to Russia seized by an intense desire to prove to himself and others that he was capable of better things than The Oprichnik.

A few years earlier, the music patron Grand Duchess Yelena Pavlovna had commissioned a libretto for an opera based on Gogol's tale from the poet Yakov Polonsky. It had originally been intended for Aleksandr Serov , but the latter had died in without commencing the project. The Grand Duchess decided to offer a prize in Serov 's memory for the best setting of the libretto. Upon her own death in responsibility for the competition passed to the Russian Musical Society.

Although Tchaikovsky eventually won first prize, the setting did not impress the public and the opera Vakula the Smith was abandoned. Nine years later, the composer radically revised it under the new title Cherevichki or "The Slippers". In the same story became the subject for Rimsky-Korsakov 's opera Christmas Eve. Three years later he described Rubinstein 's reaction on that occasion in a letter to Nadezhda von Meck : "I patiently played the concerto to the end: it was greeted with silence.

According to him my concerto was no good at all, impossible to play, with many awkward passages The composition was vulgar, and I had stolen bits from here, there, and everywhere I was not only astonished but offended by this scene". Stunned, the composer left the room without a word. Presently, Rubinstein came to Tchaikovsky and seeing how upset he was, tried to soften the blow by saying that if Tchaikovsky agreed to revise the piece, he would introduce it at one of his concerts. The concerto was indeed published exactly as it stood, but Tchaikovsky did eventually make alterations, particularly to the piano part.

Five days later, Tchaikovsky attended the premiere of the concerto in Saint Petersburg. When, later that autumn, Taneyev performed the "impossible" work at a concert of the Russian Musical Society in Moscow with Nikolay Rubinstein conducting, the concerto was proclaimed an instant success.

Tchaikovsky spent the summer of with his sister's family at Kamenka , his brother-in-law's estate in Ukraine. Here, Tchaikovsky composed his Third Symphony , this time in five movements, two of them in dance style. The symphony has since been nicknamed the "Polish", for no more reason than the marking "Tempo di polacca" of the Finale. In August, Tchaikovsky began work on what was to become the first of his famed trilogy of ballets— Swan Lake —which was commissioned by the Imperial Theatres in Moscow.

At the very end of , the composer left Russia together with his brother Modest and the latter's deaf-mute 7-year-old pupil Nikolay Konradi.

The two brothers decided to go to Paris via Germany and Switzerland. Modest was planning to study the latest methods of teaching deaf-mutes in Lyons at a private school. After about a month there Tchaikovsky travelled to Germany, where he attended the first festival devoted entirely to Wagner 's Der Ring des Niebelungen.

During his stay he made the acquaintance of Liszt , but he failed to meet Wagner himself. At the end of he was honoured by a visit from Lev Tolstoy , whom he greatly admired. Owing to terrible choreography and a poor orchestra, the ballet was not the success the composer had hoped for, but it remained in the repertory for another four seasons. Most probably he thought that he could act on his inclinations for as long as possible, but that, when it became absolutely necessary, he could simply abandon these habits.

After travelling with his brother Modest and Nikolay Konradi in early , Tchaikovsky clearly realised that the emotional atmosphere surrounding his brother's relationship with his charge was unhealthy and deeply fraught with potential, if not imminent, danger. He became conscious of this on a very personal level, since he also felt an erotic attraction to the boy, and had always been a role model for his younger brothers.

And so the composer resolved to end the crisis in his own way by setting an example himself. By this time, Tchaikovsky had also earned praise for his Second Symphony. Also in , his opera, Vakula the Smith , received harsh critical reviews, yet Tchaikovsky still managed to establish himself as a talented composer of instrumental pieces with his Piano Concerto No.

Acclaim came readily for Tchaikovsky in , with his composition Symphony No. At the end of that year, the composer embarked on a tour of Europe. In , he completed the ballet Swan Lake as well as the fantasy Francesca da Rimini. While the former has come to be one of the most frequently performed ballets of all time, Tchaikovsky again endured the ire of critics, who at its premiere panned it as too complex and too "noisy.

Tchaikovsky resigned from the Moscow Conservatory in to focus his efforts entirely on composing. As a result, he spent the remainder of his career composing more prolifically than ever. His collective body of work constitutes pieces, including symphonies, operas, ballets, concertos, cantatas and songs.

Struggling with societal pressures to repress his homosexuality, in , Tchaikovsky married a young music student named Antonina Milyukova.

The marriage was a catastrophe, with Tchaikovsky abandoning his wife within weeks of the wedding. During a nervous breakdown, he unsuccessfully attempted to commit suicide, and eventually fled abroad. Tchaikovsky could afford to resign from the Moscow Conservatory in , thanks to the patronage of a wealthy widow named Nadezhda von Meck. Go to Foreigners in Russia. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is one of the most loved Russian composers.

His music is famous for its strong emotion, and his technical skill and strict work habits helped guarantee its lasting appeal. His deep sensitivity saturated his music, producing lush melodies that have enamored listeners for over a century. Tchaikovsky was a Russian composer of the Romantic era.

Tchaikovsky's personal life was turbulent from the very beginning. As a youth, Tchaikovsky faced the hardship of losing his mother at the age of 14 and was forced to deal with the cold atmosphere of a military boarding school. As such, the young Pyotr shied away from the harsh and cold world and found solace in music.

It was upon hearing Mozart's Don Giovanni that Tchaikovsky decided to dedicate his life to music. However, other writers claim that Aleksandra doted on her son. Musically precocious, Pyotr began piano lessons at the age of five with a local woman, Maria Palchikova, and within three years could read music at the same level as his teacher. In , his father was appointed director of the St. Petersburg Technological Institute. There, the young Tchaikovsky obtained an education at the School of Jurisprudence.

Though music was not considered a high priority on the curriculum, Tchaikovsky was taken with classmates on regular visits to the theater and the opera. He was very taken with the works of Rossini, Bellini, Verdi and Mozart. The only music instruction he received at school was some piano tuition from Franz Becker, a piano manufacturer who made occasional visits as a token music teacher.

Tchaikovsky's mother died of cholera in The year-old Tchaikovsky took the news hard; for two years. He could not write about his loss, and reacted by turning to music. Within a month of her death, he was making his first serious efforts at composition; a waltz in her memory.

Tchaikovsky's father indulged his interest in music, funding studies with Rudolph Kundinger, a well-known piano teacher from Nuremberg, starting in However, when Tchaikovsky's father consulted Kundinger about prospects for a musical career for his son, Kundinger wrote that nothing suggested a potential composer or even a fine performer. Tchaikovsky was told to finish his coursework, then to try for a post in the Ministry of Justice.

Tchaikovsky graduated on May 25, , with the rank of titular counselor, the lowest rung on the civil service ladder. On June 15, he was appointed to the Ministry of Justice. Six months later the Ministry made him a junior assistant to his department and a senior assistant two months after that, where he remained.