Symfoni nr 6

Tchaikovsky sketched his sixth symphony in a total of only 12 days in March and April 1893, after which it was consigned to a drawer while he undertook other engagements and travels, including the award of an honorary doctorate at Cambridge University. He began work on the instrumentation in August and the symphony had its first public performance in Saint Petersburg on 28 October, with Tchaikovsky himself on the podium. He died nine days later of cholera, 53 years of age.

The symphony is full of extreme contrasts. The first movement vacillates between menacing tones and dazzling waves of emotion, between inaudible sextuple piano and violent attacks at maximum volume.

With their considerably lighter temperament, the two middle movements stand apart. The second movement may sound like a cheery waltz but try to dance to it and you surely will stumble, as it is written in 5/4 time. The third movement ramps up the tempo and brassiness several notches, in a march that would have been at home beneath the end credits of a patriotic western. It rises and rises triumphally – seemingly for no other reason than to present the finale in most brutal possible contrast. And brutal it is. The movement begins with frigid strings that blow in like a wind from Hades. Then darkness shrouds the music, relentless and aching, until only the cello and contrabass remain, barely audible from the abyss. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky has left the building.