1. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
May 7, 1840 – November 6, 1893

2. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky- Life
Born in Votkinsk, Russia
Age 4- Began piano
Complex relationship with his
family, esp. women
Age 10- Boarding school
Age 14- Death of mother
Establishment of sexuality

3. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky- Life
Graduation- Worked a Civil Servant
Composition with Rubenstein
Studied at St. Petersburg Conservatory
Employment at Moscow Conservatory
Romantic relationships with students
Marriage to Antonia Milyukova
Brief and traumatic
Wide-spread popularity

4. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky- Life
Received patronage from Nadezdha von Meck
Money allowed him to concentrate on music
Emotional relationship through letters
1890: communication cut off abruptly
1893 Death, possibly suicide

5. Ballets The Nutcraker Sleeping Beauty Swan Lake
Popular works, but not definitive
Swan lake:

6. Instrumental Works Piano Concerto No. 1 Symphony No. 4, 5, & 6
Deeply personal
Vehicles of expression
Possibly programmatic

7. Symphony No. 4 Dedicated to Meck “Fate motive” throughout:
“The fatal power which prevents one from attaining the goal of happiness. There is nothing to be done but to submit to it and lament in vain”

8. Symphony No. 5
Motive throughout from Glinka’s A Life for the Czar Opera- “Turn not to sorrow”
Funeral treatment of motive in first movement
Transformation to optimism in final movement
Mvt 2: (7:30)
Finale:

9. Symphony No. 6 “Pathetique”
Admitted to program
Considered using the title “Program”
“Pathetique” translates in Russian to “passionate” or “emotional”
Predicts death
Mvt 2:
Finale: (7:07)

10. Symphony No. 6
“Just as I was starting on my trip, the idea for a new symphony came to me, this time a program symphony, but with a program that shall remain unknown to all. Let them try to figure it out—the work will be called simply "A Program Symphony (No. 6)." The program for it is subjective through and through, and during my trip, as I composed it in my mind, I often actually wept. When I returned and set to work on my sketches my work went so rapidly that the entire first movement was finished in less than four days and the shape of the remaining movements was quite clear in my mind. There will be much that is novel in the form. The finale, for example, will not be a great allegro, but an extensive adagio.” -Feb. 22, 1893
“…I am confident in considering it the best and, above all, the "most genuinely sincere" of all my works. I love it as I have never loved any of my other musical offspring. “ –August 18, 1893