(program)
Funk & Wagnalls Recording. Printed in Canada // Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) // Symphony No.6
Berlin Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Walter Jurgens
Symphony No.6
Adagio—Allegro ma non troppo (in slow time—brisk, but not too fast
Allegro con grazia (brisk, with grace)
Allegro molto vivace (very fast)
Finale: Adagio lamentoso—andante
We're all walking lightly
We're all walking lightly
Let this moment last
Could become so fast
Keep walking lightly
”” Junip, Walking Lightly
Tchaikovsky had sketched out an idea for a symphony in which ‘the ultimate essence of the plan of the symphony is life’, with the final movement representing death. That was before he began work on the ‘Pathétique’, and long before the events that were to lead to his own death. “” robert philip, The Classical Music Lover’s Companion To Orchestra Music
there is a lot more of ‘life’ in this symphony than the dolorous crooning of ‘death’ the bassoon at the top of the final movement would suggest. the topic of tchaikovsky’s death has been recurrent on this blog this year: notably in may when writer anna paliy reviewed Eifman Ballet’s Tchaikovsky: Pro et Contra, a ballet set in the composer’s lucid dreams as he faces down the turbulence of his final hours. nine days after the premiere of this symphony (with the composer at the podium) tchaikovsky died apparently from cholera shortly after drinking contaminated water. not too much of a scandal to sniff out here, as long as you relegate to irrelevance the fact that it was common knowledge at that time to boil your water before drinking it; and that rumours of his homosexuality were gathering a sizeable audience and, according to music historian aleksandra orlova (‘Tchaikovsky: The Last Chapter’, Music & Letters, vol. 62 (1981)), there had been an ultimatum proposed to which tchaikovsky chose the fatal alternative:
According to this version of events, Duke Stenbok-Fermor, who was disturbed by the attention that Tchaikovsky was paying to his young nephew, threatened him with exposure by writing a letter to the Tsrar. The civil servant to whom he gave the letter was a fellow pupil at Tchaikovsky’s school, and he convened a court of former students to interview the composer and decide his fate. They concluded that the only way for Tchaikovsky and the school to avoid public disgrace was for the composer to kill himself. A few days later, reports emerged that Tchaikovsky was on his deathbed. “” robert philip, The Classical Music Lover’s Companion To Orchestra Music
pro et contra; life or death; major or minor chords; illness or suicide; passionate or pathétique (french translation of former)——there are a lot of dichotomies surrounding this symphony, subject to arguments ad inifitum. but it is also a work that enjoys a life of its own independent of the circumstances surrounding its creation. it is at times festive——danceable even——each movement a catalogue of melodies that might stay with you on the ride home after a concert. the whole work replete with that lush lyricism that is characteristically tchaikovsky, and would engender the imagination of the next generation of composers. take notice, for example, how suspiciously similar the opening stretch of sibelius’s Symphony No.1 is to this one.
despite this breathtaking variety, it is the final movement, beginning Adagio lamentoso, that dominates the popular perception of this symphony. even the brief jolt when the tempo quickens to Andante is unable to resist the quiet resignation that brings the symphony to a close. the movement begins with a melody on strings in a minor key, the movement’s first theme, slowly gathering momentum as bassoons and flutes fill the background with a call-and-response pattern. the accumulated energy comes to a brief respite before reaching a cathartic climax. the first theme repeats again on strings, while bassoons maintains long cadential melodic lines. french horns and trumpets introduce a second theme at the tail end of the bassoons’ part, adding a bit of lightness with a melody in D major, which the composer advised to be played ‘gently and devoutly’. the locomotive rises at last to a booming climax, that dissolves into scales and returns once more to rest. as the pattern suggests: strings return again with the first theme, on top of which horns layer in counterpoint, to which strings respond by bringing that first theme to its highest climax yet, with some muscle from the brass and horn section. again the momentum comes to rest, but instead of being revved back to life by the first theme on strings, it is a pair of trombones that appear with the second theme, in B Minor this time around. double bases, reminiscent of the earlier role played by bassoons, begin the slow retreat that drags the symphony, below high strings, to its quiet end.
Whatever personal anguish went into the writing of this symphony, Tchaikovsky wrote that it was the best and most sincere of all his works: ‘I love it as I have never loved any of my other musical offspring.’ “” robert philip, The Classical Music Lover’s Companion To Orchestra Music
(song of the week: Walking Lightly —— Junip)
Junip is the somewhat ongoing side-project of josé gonzález——swedish-argentinian folk musician and fabricator of danceable, and simultaneously cry-able, melodies. known popularly for the crooning lullabies of Heartbeats and Crosses, his more percussive and electronic experiments are my favourite of gonzález (Let it Carry You, Killing for Love, This is How We Walk on the Moon). Junip seems to be a convergence of both of his styles: josé with his usual acoustic guitar, accompanied by a drum set and Moog synthesizer, over and under the same ethereally remote lyrics.
on instagram and elsewhere, i ran into a couple mentions of william wordsworth this week, and by general association was reminded of a poem of his that procured in me, when i first read it years ago, the same feeling as this song; of early morning, open fields, blue skies, long journeys etc.. in this poem wordsworth recounts a very brief encounter he has with a local while on a journey by foot. he’s asked by her which direction he’s heading; it’s the syntax of the question “What you are stepping...?” that caught the poet’s inner ear. as if asking, simultaneously, where he is going and if she can come:
‘Crack Willows’ — Hjalmar Munsterhjelm, 1897
"What you are stepping westward?"—"Yea."
—'Twould be a wildish destiny,
If we, who thus together roam
In a strange Land, and far from home,
Were in this place the guests of Chance:
Yet who would stop, or fear to advance,
Though home or shelter he had none,
With such a Sky to lead him on?
The dewy ground was dark and cold;
Behind, all gloomy to behold;
And stepping westward seem'd to be
A kind of heavenly destiny:
I liked the greeting; 'twas a sound
Of something without place or bound;
And seemed to give me spiritual right
To travel through that region bright.
The voice was soft, and she who spake
Was walking by her native Lake:
The salutation had to me
The very sound of courtesy:
Its power was felt; and while my eye
Was fixed upon the glowing sky,
The echo of the voice enwrought
A human sweetness with the thought
Of travelling through the world that lay
Before me in my endless way.
“” Stepping Westward, william wordsworth