Tchaikovsky composed musical settings from the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom. He was very moved by the traditions and pageantry of the Russian Orthodox style of worship and during his life his faith gradually grew stronger. “I very often go to mass: the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom is, in my view, one of the greatest works of art.” He also composed settings of texts from the Russian Orthodox All-Night Vigil ceremony. “I am now arranging for full choir the basic chants of the All-Night Vigil. I want to preserve the ancient ecclesiastical chants quite untouched.” These compositions inspired Rachmaninoff to compose his own versions of them.
Tchaikovsky wrote about his process of composing. “The main idea and the general outline of all the separate parts should not be arrived at by process of looking for them, but should suggest themselves through the supernatural, inscrutable power called inspiration. When I have the main idea and when it starts to grow into distinct shapes, measureless bliss possesses me. You forget everything, you become almost demented, you tremble and throb inwardly, you can scarcely manage to get the sketches down as one idea piles upon another.
“Musical ideas always come to me in their complete form. This means I never conceive a melody without the harmony and orchestration to go with it. I write my sketches in a very abbreviated form on the first scrap of paper that comes to hand. The sketching is accompanied by anxiety, by a kind of nervous excitement. You sleep badly and sometimes you completely forget to eat.
Sometimes in the midst of this miraculous process an external stimulus suddenly rouses you; somebody rings at the door, a servant comes in, the clock strikes and reminds you that you have an appointment. Such interruptions are indescribably troublesome.
“Sometimes inspiration slips away and is elusive. You very often have to conquer laziness and disinclination. But I consider it an artist’s duty never to give in to them. One must not wait. Inspiration is a guest who does not like visiting the lazy. She comes to those who invite her. The whole secret is working systematically every day. In this respect I have an iron grip on myself and when I don’t especially feel like working I can always make myself overcome my disinclination and develop some enthusiasm.”
He wrote: “I have just finished my symphonic ballad, Voyevoda, and I am very pleased with it.” Six weeks later he wrote: “My new composition, Voyevoda, is no good and I am going to destroy it. I fear that this is a sign of the decline of my powers. And so it seems that until I draw my last breath I will only strive for mastery and never attain it.” Tchaikovsky did destroy the score, but fortunately, the orchestral parts survived and were kept and reconstructed after his death!
“As soon as one composition is finished I immediately feel the irresistible urge to start on a new one. Work, this sort of work is as necessary to me as the air I breathe. As soon as I succumb to idleness I begin to feel melancholy, to have doubts about my ability. I feel dissatisfied and even hate myself. I begin to feel that I am a useless creature. The only way to escape from these excruciating doubts and self-recriminations is to get down to work again. I am very inclined to hypochondria and I know that I must not give in to the attractions of idleness. Work alone can save me.”
“I had scarcely embarked on a few days of doing absolutely nothing when I began to feel weary and weak, not feeling well; I began to sleep badly. I couldn’t hold out and I started doing a bit of work on sketching out my next symphony— and then? And then I immediately felt healthy and fit, and my mind was at rest.”
“Life is a constant alteration between grim reality and fading visions and dreams of happiness. An artist lives a double life: an everyday human life, and an artistic life. It is absolutely necessary for a composer to shake off all the cares of daily existence, at least for a time, and give himself up entirely to his art-life.”
Tchaikovsky constantly moved around, usually staying on his brother-in-law’s estate and in the various homes his patroness made available to him in Russia, Italy, and Switzerland. Interestingly, Tchaikovsky didn’t have a residence of his own until the last years of his life. He always had a young male valet live and travel with him except short periods when he was alone. “Because I am dreadfully absent-minded and I’m constantly absorbed in my music, I need someone around to look after me and all my possessions. Half of the clothes in the linen are now missing. I haven’t the remotest notion what has happened to the rest. I will have to get a grip on myself and pay attention to these things but unfortunately it would be easier for me to write 40 symphonies than to keep my few possessions in order.
“In a sad period like the one we are now going through only art can distract our attention from unpleasant reality. When I sit at the piano I am completely isolated from all the tormenting questions which weigh us down. Is this perhaps egoistic? But then each of us serves the general good in his own way; and art is, in my view, an essential requirement for humanity. Outside of the musical sphere I am incapable of being of service to my neighbor.
Tchaikovsky composed his tragic opera Mazeppa based on a poem by Pushkin. He frequently attended concerts given by Paul Pabst, and used to refer to him as “a pianist of divine elegance, a pianist from God. I heard Pabst’s Fantasie on Mazeppa. It was quite effective.” Pabst created several piano fantasies based on Tchaikovsky’s theatrical works.
“I wish, desire, and love people to be interested in my music, but I have never sought that they should be interested in me personally. I have always hated publicity. There is a sense of alienation, fear of others, timidity, excessive shyness, mistrustfulness – which make me more and more unsociable.”
“I am constantly exchanging letters with my four brothers, my sister, several cousins, innumerable friends and acquaintances, and on top of that I have mountains of correspondence with people who are very often quite unknown to me.” It was not unusual for Tchaikovsky to write up to 20 letters per day, and most of them were quite long.
Tsar Alexander III conferred the Order of St. Vladimir upon Tchaikovsky, which included a title of hereditary nobility and a personal audience with the Tsar, who awarded Tchaikovsky a lifetime annual pension of 3,000 rubles.
In 1890 Nadezda von Meck, Tchaikovsky’s patroness for 13 years, wrote to him stating that she was ruined financially and was stopping his allowance. Her financial difficulties were only temporary but she was also ill, greatly suffering from arthritis. Perhaps she was pressured by her family to stop his allowance once the Tsar awarded him an annual pension. His letters to her may have been intercepted because at this time she also abruptly stopped their correspondence and didn’t answer his letters.
Tchaikovsky wrote “She has treated me very cruelly. I have never before felt so humiliated, so wounded in my pride.” From 1890 von Meck’s life slowly declined, due to a terrible nervous disease, which changed her relationship not only with Tchaikovsky, but with others. She passed away 2 months after Tchaikovsky.
His Trio for piano, violin and cello was composed as a tribute to his friend Nikolai Rubinstein, who had died several months earlier. He subtitled the Trio “In memory of a great artist. Of my works I can say with my hand on my heart that with very few exceptions they come straight from my heart.”
Tchaikovsky’s penultimate opera is The Queen of Spades, based on a novella by Pushkin. “I admit that I like it the best of my operas and there are lots of passages in it which take my breath away and I want to cry. I wrote it with unusual zeal and enthusiasm, and put my whole soul into this work.
“I sketched out the opera particularly quickly in less than 6 weeks. It may very well be that The Queen of Spades is a very poor opera; it is quite possible that in a year’s time I will dislike it, as I dislike many of my creations; but right now I believe this is my best writing and that the opera has a brilliant future”.
“The trick is to write with love. And The Queen of Spades was written with particular love. I finished the opera 3 hours ago. When I reached the scene of Herman’s death and final chorus, I felt such pity for Herman that I suddenly began to weep out loud bitterly. I had never had sobbing like that before.” While the opera was given an enormous reception at its world premiere, the critics unanimously condemned the libretto and didn’t approve of the music. “He not only repeats himself, but does not shrink from imitating other composers.” Another thought this “the weakest of all his efforts at opera.” However the audiences loved it and its success increased from one performance to the next, despite the ranting of the press.
In 1884 he wrote: “My English studies are going so well I can now read Dickens without difficulty and without constantly looking words up in the dictionary.
In 1891 Tchaikovsky was invited to the United States to conduct several performances of his music for the grand opening of Carnegie Hall and performances in Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, and Baltimore. Just as he departed for America his sister Aleksandra passed away.“It is difficult to convey what I went through but I do not recollect ever being so unhappy.” And he wrote about feeling homesick “which I can now never avoid when I am away from Russia.”
He was treated like a king in the United States. “I am 10 times better known in America than I am in Europe. Isn’t that odd?!!!” He was delighted with his hotel accommodations in New York writing “There are all sorts of things to make one comfortable which do not exist in Europe.” He was impressed by the tall buildings, he called Central Park “magnificent”, and visited Niagara Falls writing “I will not describe the beauty of the Niagara Falls, for these things are difficult to express in words.” He was very impressed with Andrew Carnegie writing “Carnegie, an amazing eccentric, who from being a telegraph boy, became one of America’s richest men, but who has remained a simple, modest man who does not at all turn his nose up at anyone, and inspires an unusual warmth of feeling in me. Although I was most perfectly received in New York, and in spite of having seen much in America that was interesting I longed to get home and cannot say how happy I was when I found myself back in Russia.”
Tchaikovsky composed his Violin Concerto in Switzerland in 1878, where he had gone to recover from the nervous breakdown after his disastrous marriage. Jascha Heifetz’s teacher, Leopold Auer refused to perform the work, stating it was “unviolinistic and impossible to play”. Eduard Hanslick, the dean of Viennese music critics lambasted it as “music that stinks to the ear”. It has since become one of the most popular violin concertos ever.
In 1881 Tchaikovsky spent several weeks in Italy. “I read Italian quite fluently, but speak it pretty badly. I have been right to the top of the volcano at Mr. Vesuvius, which is a sight of hellish magnificence. Tivoli is one of the most enchanting places I have ever seen. Of all I have seen I was most impressed with Sorrento. If there is a place on this earth which one can call paradise, it must be this wonderful corner of the world.”
“I have also discovered how important it is to look at a painting intently and for a long time. Every painting needs at least a whole day, such as Rafael’s Transfiguration.
“Michelangelo’s frescos in the Sistine chapel fill me with wonder at his original and powerful beauty. Here a miracle was worked. The more I see of Michelangelo the more he astonishes me. Michelangelo’s Moses is a tremendous work! On a number of occasions I have stood gazing at the statue for a long time and on each occasion I feel even greater reverence for it. I stood looking at it for a long time. The face of Moses is filled with awful wrath. It began to frighten me. He is a majestic and commanding figure. Nothing more perfect than this mighty statue can be imagined.
“I have started making sketches for an Italian fantasy on folk tunes, Capriccio Italien. It will be effective thanks to the delightful melodies which I succeeded in collecting partly from albums and partly with my own ears from the streets in Italy. The sketches were completed within a week.”
In 1892, Tchaikovsky was voted a member of the Académie des Beaux-Arts, only the second Russian to be so honored. The following year, the University of Cambridge awarded him an honorary Doctor of Music degree.
His 6th Symphony, the “Pathétique” was composed just months before his death and is one of his greatest masterpieces. “As I was mentally composing it on my travels I frequently wept copiously. “I cannot longer write so quickly as before because I have become far more severe on myself and I lack my former self-confidence. I definitely think it is by far the best and in particular by far the most sincere of all my pieces. I love it as I have never loved any other of my musical children and I am more proud of it than of any other of my works. It is no exaggeration to say that I have put my whole soul into this symphony.” Tchaikovsky’s dedication of his 6th Symphony to his nephew and the feelings he expressed about him in his letters are indicative of romantic love between the two. Davydov committed suicide in 1906 when he was just 34. Tchaikovsky conducted the world premiere of his last symphony just nine days before his death at 53. It ranges from intense passion to deep despair and is often thought to have been Tchaikovsky’s Requiem for himself, perhaps a premonition of his early death.
Tchaikovsky’s sudden death has long been ascribed to the cholera epidemic at the time in St. Petersburg. But there is an ongoing debate as to whether cholera was really the cause or if his death was a mandatory suicide.
From Alexandra Orlova’s book Tchaikovsky A Self Portrait: “Count Stenbock-Fermor had become concerned by the attentions which Tchaikovsky was paying to the count’s young nephew. He wrote an indignant letter addressed to the Tsar and had handed this letter to Nikolai Jacobi of the Russian Senate.” Exposure would have threatened Tchaikovsky as well as the sacred honor of his alma mater, the School of Jurisprudence and its alumni.
In order to prevent this from becoming public knowledge, Jacobi invited Tchaikovsky and his former fellow students to his house and held a court of honor of eight men. The meeting lasted almost 5 hours. Their conclusion was that the letter to the Tsar could be suppressed only in the event of Tchaikovsky’s death.
Tchaikovsky may have returned home very upset and drank a glass of unboiled water possibly taking poison with it. What actually happened cannot be conclusively determined because many of the documents in the Tchaikovsky archives are still under lock and seal. However, in 1960 at a lecture on forensic medicine in the First Leningrad Medical Institute, the case of Tchaikovsky was cited as an example of enforced suicide.
The accounts by first-hand witnesses of Tchaikovsky’s illness and death include many contradictions. Also, Tchaikovsky’s contemporaries were astonished and perplexed by the failure to observe the most elementary precautions.
The government’s orders concerning those who have died from cholera were very specific. “In the event of a death from cholera the body should be removed from the house as soon as possible in a hermetically sealed coffin; it is also recommended that the arrangement of a widely attended funeral service or funeral banquet should be avoided.”
In Tchaikovsky’s case all the rules were violated. 15 people gathered around him as he died. His corpse was on the view for two days. Requiem masses took place in the presence of a constant stream of people. The composer Rimsky-Korsakov remembered that it was strange that although the death was said to be the result of cholera, there was free access. “I remember seeing the cellist Alexander Verzhbilovich kiss the corpse’s head and face.” In the 1920s Tchaikovsky’s doctor, Vasily Bertenson, who attended to him as he lay dying told the musicologist, Georgy Orlova that Tchaikovsky committed suicide.
No other composer has successfully captured the fairy-tale world of childhood innocence as inimitably as Tchaikovsky in his ballet The Nutcracker. The world premieres of his last opera, Iolante and The Nutcracker in 1892 were performed as a double bill. They were a great success with the public but not with the press. He wrote “The whole of the Petersburg press is busy cursing my latest offspring in a variety of styles. I know that in the end I will get my due.
Here’s a short video: https://youtu.be/B3FOfNkVXxo