THAT QUEER FELLOW, TCHAIKOVSKI

New Zealand Listener, Volume 2, Issue 45, 3 May 1940, Page 20

THAT QUEER FELLOW, TCHAIKOVSKI

His Life Was a Burden, His Music a Blessing

wrote to The Listener saying that, after reading Mozart’s life, she would never again be able to enjoy his music. However the case may be with Mozart, a full understanding of Peter Ilyich Tchaikovski’s life should lead to a deeper appreciation of his music. Tchaikovski, whose centenary falls on May 7, was the most autobiographical of composers, revealing himself in every note he wrote. More often than not his melody shows the unhappy lover, the frustrated, neurotic introvert; but sometimes it shows, too, the genial, smiling Uncle Peter, who was wont to come home to his sister's door laden with presents for his nieces and nephews, FEW months ago, a correspondent

a simple, laughing peasant tune in his heart. Tchaikovski the Child As ‘a child, he showed a marked preference for playing the piano. and writing poetry rather than for games with other children. When he was seven, he was given his first piano lessons, and from then on he studied hard. His parents had no idea of their son’s_ becoming a musician and he was set to learning law, eventually becoming a clerk in the Ministry of Justice. But

music, even from a street barrei-organ, continued to excite him strangely, and when at last Anton Rubenstein, under the patronage of the music-loving Grand Duchess Helena Pavlovna, founded the Petersburg Conservatory, Tchaikovski forcook the drudgery of pen-pushing and became a serious student of composition there. Later he went to Nicholas Rubinstein’s Music Conservatory in Moscow as Professor of Harmony. Unhappy Marriage All this time, Tchaikovski travelled the hard, lonely road of a creative artist, composing slowly but surely in a style that was purely his own, but which derived from all the Romantics in musicSchumann and Chopin and others. As for the coldly brilliant Bach, Tchaikovski once declared he hated him, and he never liked Brahms. Added to the strain of composing were the troubles of his private life. While he was working on his opera, "Eugene Onegin,’ from Pushkin’s story, and brooding on the heartlessness of Onegin in his treatment of Tatyana, he met a young woman, Antonina Milyukova, and contracted a marriage with her. Perhaps pity, and his own innate warmth of heart, made him propose this union. He saw in himself another Onegin, and was determined not to show the latter’s heartlessness. But for such a neurotic as he was, marriage proved too heavy a burden, and he soon tried to do away with himself. After nine weeks, he could stand the

strain of his marriage no longer, and the unhappy pair separated. The .Widow Von Meck It is difficult to determine what would have happened to him had he not had the long friendship. with his. patroness, the widow Nadejda Von Meck. This woman was a stern matriarch who, after her husband’s death, lived in almost complete seclusion, but she had a genuine passion for music. Understanding Tchaikovski, his constant struggles in private and creative life, she gave him an allowance which freed him from financial troubles, and perhaps more important still, she- became a confidant to whom he could pour out all his worries.

An Exile Longing for Home Tchaikovski was never satisfied completely with what he had done, and his failure, in his own eyes, to achieve what he had in mind in. his compositions was a source of unhappiness to him. Throughout his life, even after his unhappy marriage had been left behind, melancholy drove him from place to place. ‘He travelled far from Russia to escape the bitter weather and his own sense. of despair and futility. But in Italy, or Germany,

or wherever he stayed, he was not content for long; away from home, he would sigh for "Little Mother Russia," and yearn for the sight of snow, the crisp northern climate, and familiar places. It is in his last three symphonies, and especially in the sixth, that his emotional turmoil and travail is shown. Sombre as his outlook was, however, he had time to write, near the end, "The Sleeping Beauty,’ one of his most delightful works. Drank Cholera-Infected Water Yet his "Pathetic Symphony" must be regarded as his last will and testament. The friendship with Nadejda Von Meck had finished as strangely as it began, Tchaikovski’s nervous complaints increased, his ‘sense of being friendless and frustrated grew. Into this last symphony he poured all the happiness and grief and sorrow he knew. A few weeks after it was finished he drank water infected with cholera, and in the bleak Petersburg winter of 1893, he died, at the age of fifty-three. For the centenary of Tchaikovski, special programmes are being presented from 2YA Wellington on Sunday, May 5. At 2p.m. the music of the ballet, "The Sleeping Beauty" will be presented. At 3p.m., Dr. Markham Lee, M.A., Mus.Doc. (Cantab.), will give a talk on Tchaikovski. In the evening there will be a special programme on the man and-his works, and the play, " The Marriage of Tchaikovski," will be broadcast.