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Example research essay topic: Russian Romantic Music And Tchaikovsky - 1,589 words

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Russian Romantic Music and Tchaikovsky Russian music bears its own styles and emotions, free from the outside influence of other European countries during the Romantic period. Politics play an indirect role in the development of Russian music, isolating the country both politically and musically. Until the Decembrist revolt in 1825, Russia was under the unrelenting rule of czars. Russia retained the ways of the old -- its caste system, its severity of censorship -- while the rest of Europe had already shed its Middle Age characteristics.

Since the revolt, it had become fashionable for the educated public to promote social reform. Political activity in Russia was a dangerous game, likely to lead to death or exile. Because of this, Russians turned to their national roots, finding solace in rich folk culture and explorations in art, literature, and music. A new concern for national differences in language and the arts provoked a new age of nationalism. For Russia, music was seen as a particularly strong way of expressing the soul of a people. In Russia, the leader of the nationalist revival was Mikhail Glinka.

His followers Rimsky-Korsakov, Balakirev, Car Cui, Borodin, and Mussorgsky became known as The Five. These composers were an unusual crowd of dedicated drinkers, but despite that, they were also exquisitely talented amateur composers. Borodin worked as a chemist; Car Cui was a military engineer; and Modest Mussorgsky was a civil servant whom the rest of the group regarded with contempt. The most successful of The Five was Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov, who was an accomplished and skillful orchestrator. His operas, based on Russian folk songs, were very popular in their time, while his attractive orchestral works such as Sheherazade and the famous Spanish Capriccio are still often heard today. The leader of the group was My Balakirev, whose judgement was feared by everybody in the group.

Balakirev was a fierce nationalist, actively detesting any form of art that was not purely Russian. His aim was to establish a truly national music, and much of The Fives time was spent criticizing and rewriting other peoples compositions including each others in the approved Russian style. No one dared challenge the authority of The Five. One man attempted to project his own voice.

That man was Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. His music had a special appeal to his listeners: memorable tunes, whether passionately eloquent or stylishly graceful; wild, abandoned dance music; the sheer grandeur of pieces such as the 1812 Overture or the famous opening of his Piano Concert No. 1; and most strikingly, his masterful handling of a vast palette of orchestral color. Ironically, Tchaikovsky was to win far more renown for Russian music abroad than any of his fellow nationalists. Tchaikovsky's music was always easy to listen to, giving immense pleasure even at its most tragic and overwhelmingly emotional climaxes. In contrast to his enjoyable music, Tchaikovsky's life was exceedingly tumultuous and unhappy. The man himself was often melancholy and moody.

These qualities were result of his own temperament: he was a hypochondriac, and was homosexual, which was regarded as a great shame and disgrace at that time. But after all, he was Russian, and like many of his fellow countrymen, was impelled towards displays of extreme emotion. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was born on May 7, 1840, in Kamsko-Votkinsk, a small industrial town east of Moscow. His father, Ilya Petrovich, was a mining engineer. He was a person of high standing in Kamsko-Votkinsk and was able to comfortably provide for his wife and four children.

Pyotr's mother Alexandra was a nervous epileptic, of whom Pyotr inherited his tendency to real or imagined ill-health, fits of hysteria, and deep depression... Even as a youngster, Pyotr Tchaikovsky was hypersensitive; the slightest scolding would reduce him to a flood of tears. Besides this, his parents were also worried about his addition to music, which often ironically seemed to upset him. One night after a party, Alexandra found him awake, pointing to his forehead, and crying, Oh this music, this music! Take it away! Its here and it wont let me sleep!

Pyotr's father was in possession of a great variety of music, playable on the Orchestrion, a rudimentary form of a record player. It was his listening of tunes from the opera Don Giovanni on the Orchestrion that Pyotr dedicated his lifelong admiration to Mozart. It was due to Mozart that I devoted my life to music, he wrote many years later. Tchaikovsky began to play the piano early in childhood. His first teacher was Maria Palchikova, a freed serf.

As mentioned earlier, the influence of the czar retained the old caste system. Within a year, Tchaikovsky was able to play better than she could. At the age of ten, Pyotr was send to St. Petersburg to study at the School of Jurisprudence. A reluctant student, Tchaikovsky worked without much interest, but was naturally gifted and quickly passed through his schools upper divisions. Meanwhile, he kept up with his profound interest in music, taking lessons from the well-known concert pianist Rudolph Kndinger.

Kndinger was impressed by Pyotr's ability to improvise, but beyond that, Pyotr's teacher though that he had no unusual talent for music. When Pyotr's father asked Kndinger if he should change his mind and consider encouraging the boys interest in the piano with a view to a career, Kndinger advised him against it. Kndinger later said, certainly [Pyotr] was gifted, he had a good ear and a good memory, a fine touch, but otherwise there was nothing, absolutely nothing, that suggested a composer. Tchaikovsky entered the Ministry of Justice in St.

Petersburg as civil servant. To ordinary Russians, civil servants were then people to be shunned and hated: they represented petty officialdom and oppression. Tchaikovsky was not naturally suited to such a job: he was not really interested in politics, and he was once said to have absentmindedly torn up an important document, rolled the scraps into pellets and swallowing them. He remained at the Ministry of Justice for four years, bored but dutiful. While Tchaikovsky worked as a civil servant, he found that his duties were not heavy ones. He was able to take a leave of three months to accompany a relative around Europe, acting as his interpreter.

Also, Tchaikovsky had plenty of time for music, playing the piano and going to concerts. He joined the Ministry's own choral group, and in 1861, he began to study musical theory under Nikolai Zaremba, the Head of the Russian Musical Society. One of Tchaikovsky's music teachers was the pianist and composer Anton Rubenstein, who became the first directory of the St. Petersburg Music Conservatory. He had observed that Tchaikovsky's technique was merely amateur, so he corrected the young mans exercises.

Rubenstein was the first to see real signs of talent, but had to criticize Tchaikovsky for years of careless work. Tchaikovsky began to realize that he had to be serious about his music in order to make true progress. When he failed to get a promotion he had wanted at the Ministry, he decided to resign and start his career all over again. Tchaikovsky entered the St. Petersburg Music Conservatory at the age of twenty-two, and was much older than most of the other students. But he also had more experience, and supported himself by teaching pupils of his own.

He learned how to play the organ and mastered the flute, which he then played in the Conservatory orchestra. Rubenstein had been a moving force in Tchaikovsky's composing career by criticizing all of his compositions. In 1864, Rubenstein was very critical of Tchaikovsky's most important student piece, The Storm Overture, inspired by a melancholy play by Russian dramatist Ostrovsky. While Rubenstein had expected Tchaikovsky's composition to be dark and dreary, Tchaikovsky instead created a colorful, dramatic piece of program music, including unusual instruments such as the harp, oboe, and tuba. Rubenstein was furious because this was not the kind of thing he expected from his normally obedient students. He was also very critical of Tchaikovsky's graduation exercise, a cantata representing Schiller's Ode to Joy.

The cantata was performed January 12, 1866, in the presence of a distinguished audience but Tchaikovsky was too nervous face the pressure of the occasion. Rubenstein threatened to withhold Tchaikovsky's diploma, but nobody could deny Pyotr's outstanding talent. His presence was now known. Tchaikovsky was later offered a job as professor of harmony at the newly-established Moscow Conservatory, where Anton Rubenstein's younger brother, Nikolai, was directory. Nikolai offered lodgings and support to Pyotr for the following five years. Nevertheless, as Tchaikovsky faced the new pressures of teaching, he overworked himself and his students.

Like many of the Russian upper classes, he had found refuge in heavy alcoholism. Tchaikovsky's first major musical success came when Anton Rubenstein conducted his Overture in F major at a concert on March 16, 1866. Tchaikovsky was so inspired that he immediately began to work on his first symphony. This composition cost him many sleepless nights and provoked a nervous breakdown; he was unable to sleep, suffered from terrible headaches, and was convinced that he was on the brink of death. Despite his nervous problems, Tchaikovsky was determined to complete Symphony No. 1, which he named Winter Daydreams. And when he made his first public appearance as a conductor, the experience terrified him so much that it was ten years before he ever attempted another public performance.

The first two movements of Symphony No. 1 had subtitles: Daydreams of a Winter Journey, and Land of Desolation, Land of Mists. Both movements possessed tun...


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