INTRODUCTION
Among the illustrious names that have already conquered time and will live forever is that of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. He is our favorite composer who was born in Russia in 1840 at Votkinsk on the foothills of the Ural. At first he studied law, but later gave it up for music. His many compositions include operas, symphonies, romances and instrumental pieces. While some brought him joy, others he would have been glad to renounce. He enjoyed the devotion of friends, the plaudits of the public, but also felt the chill hostility of musical critics. He won renown as a composer, a teacher, a critic and connoisseur of the arts of his own and other countries. On occasions he had reason to rejoice, to fret, to love and to fight. Now his name is well-known and everybody knows him as a great musician. His melodies are familiar to everybody.
The purpose of this paper is to find reason of Tchaikovsky’s music popularity all over the world.
Main goals:
Learn more historical facts about Tchaikovsky’s music;
Visit Tchaikovsky’s house, museum;
Become a volunteer at the International Music Festival named in Tchaikovsky’s honour;
Discuss the importance of Tchaikovsky’s music with guests and musicians from different countries.
MAIN PART
2.1 HISTORY IN KLIN
HIS HOUSE IN KLIN
The memory of Tchaikovsky is dear to all music lovers. When coming to Moscow they unfailingly visit Klin. It takes about two hours to get to Klin from Moscow by suburban electric train, and this travel is well worth it: people come there to see his house, now a memorial museum, things that had surrounded him, the piano his fingers had brought to life. By tradition its lid is lifted only once a year, on Tchaikovsky’s birthday. On that day, May 8, it is played on by the best Russian and foreign pianists. [18], [19].
Every item, even the smallest, in that house is warmed by Tchaikovsky’s spirit. The composer moved to live there in 1892, shortly before his death, after travelling over the most of Russia and extensively throughout Europe.
“My attachment to Moscow has proved to be so firm that I find it more pleasant to live near that city than anywhere else. Apart from this I have grown so fond of Moscow’s surroundings that no place in any of the countries I have visited could attract me more” [1], Tchaikovsky said.
During that final year of his life he visited Saint Petersburg, Odessa, Paris, Prague, Berlin, London and other cities, and everywhere was welcomed with ovations. Wherever he went, however, his heart always drew him back to Klin. It was where he felt really at home.
There, in his former house stacks and stacks of books and music manuscript are treasured. Portraits of great musicians grace the walls: Beethoven, whom he revered, and Anton Rubinstein, who guided his studies at St. Petersburg Conservatoire…
Visitors stand spellbound before a large desk still strewn with music manuscripts in Tchaikovsky’s handwriting. The most striking feature in the next room is the little writing table at which Tchaikovsky created his final masterpiece “The Pathetic Symphony” in thirteen days, in February 1893.
In visitors’ book kept by the caretakers of the museum many people from all over the world have written words of affection and gratitude from our contemporaries to the great composer of the past. Their notes and comments are written in many languages [2].
2. 2 FESTIVALS
THE CONSERVATOIRE NAMED IN HIS HONOUR
Even the usual buzz of the city cannot muffle the music escaping through double windows of the Conservatoire.
Conservatoire had been organized by the outstanding pianist and conductor Nikolai Rubinstein. When Tchaikovsky gave his first lesson there he was scarcely older than those who attend the Conservatoire today. He didn’t look like a teacher in his old boots and worn raccoon coat he had borrowed from the poet Apukhtin (Tchaikovsky later wrote six splendid songs to his poems) [3]. Everything he owned fitted easily into a small suitcase and he was only twenty-six years old at that time.
Now it is very hard to find any orchestra or philharmonic society in Russia without the graduates of the Moscow Conservatoire. Indeed, also many can be met beyond our country. One of the singers of the Sophia Opera House, for instance, is Dimitry Usunov who is known for his splendid performance of Herman in “The Queen of Spades” [4] and Vodemont in “Iolanthe” [5]. The heights of world fame are gradually being reached by Bulgarian singer Nikolai Gyaurov, too, who often appears on the stages of La Scala and the Grande Opera.
Every spring solemn graduation exercises heard from the Conservatoire herald the uprising of new cohort of composers, theoreticians and virtuosi. Many of them, moreover, are known to the public long before their diploma concerts, for the Conservatoire’s students successfully participate in international contests. Yevgeny Mogilevsky, for instance, became a Laureate of the Queen Elisabeth International Contest of Pianist in Brussels before he entered his second year at the Conservatoire.
The names of many graduates of the Moscow Conservatoire have become synonymous with superb music, as the Austrian critic Marcel Rubin put it. This may be said of the pianists Svyatoslav Richer and Emil Gilels, the violinist Leonid Kogan, the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich and the composers Dmitry Kabalevsky and Aram Khachaturin. Many of these musicians, popular at home and abroad, are now teaching in classrooms they attended as students, and daily interaction with young musicians adds new colour and depth to their art.
Student years, it is said, are fondly remembered into old age, and in whichever school you might have spent your youth, you cannot help being deeply moved when walking down the Conservatoire corridors during a weekday, when studies are in full swing. Everything will seem familiar to you: tense intellectual life, selfless arguments meant not so much to convince as to formulate thoughts, the sudden flashes of laughter and mischievous pranks. An outlander will not be inconvenienced by his unfamiliarity with Russian language, for the main thing here is music and it needs no translation.
Tchaikovsky's music accompanies each student throughout his studies at the Conservatoire, from the first to the last day, inspiring by songs, arias and cantatas which are full of deep feelings. It is universally recognized that they were written with the deep understanding of the human voice and are therefore exceptionally "convenient" for singers. At the class of ensemble one constantly hears Tchaikovsky's quartets, his sextet “Recollections of Florence” and, of course, his deeply sorrowful trio "In Memory of a Great Artist" written on the occasion of Nickolai Rubinstein's death. The scores of Tchaikovsky's operas, symphonies and concertos studied by future composers acquaint them with the very best of musical culture.
The Conservatoire is full of stirring reminders of the past. Inscribed in gold on plaques of marble are the names of those who graduated from there Conservatoire with honour. They reach far back into the past, with one of earliest names recorded being that of Sergei Rakhmaninov [6]. Here there are no borders between epochs, and the plaques seem to be linking generations.
At the Conservatoire you will no doubt be told of the selfless work done by the students outside their classrooms. They deliver lectures and give concerts at the factory clubs of Moscow, as well as in the towns and villages of the most remote parts of our country. They regard these social activities as a fulfillment of one of Tchaikovsky’s behests – to bring all Russia’s cultural life to bloom. “Dreaming of the remote future”, [7] Tchaikovsky wrote, “I see Mother Moscow as a truly European city, the centre of a great civilized country zealous for art and craving earnest artistic gratification” [8].
No matter how careless one will read the history of the Moscow Conservatoire, one fact will not be missed: it was the students of the Conservatoire who first performed “Eugene Onegin” which has since become part of the repertoire of nearly all the opera houses all over the world.
Tchaikovsky never sought to surprise his hearers with his originality. He strove merely to find the most expressive media to convey the feelings that moved his soul. But with such thoughts in mind he created the masterpiece that was pathbreaking not only to his own style, but to the world of opera as a whole.
Operas of those days more often unfolded beneath the vaults of palaces or temples, taking place in remote historical settings. Tchaikovsky, for his part, brought heroes of his opera into in an ordinary house in “Onegin”, described real life, the sort of life with which thousands of his contemporaries were familiar. The hero of the new opera appeared on the stage in ordinary clothes, much like those worn by the people who came to the theatre. The characters on the stage made ordinary things or chatted amiably about the trifles of life. Behind this commonplace atmosphere, however, Tchaikovsky perceived and conveyed such truths of life, such poetry, depth and force of emotion that everyone who saw the opera for the first time was deeply moved.
The composer feared that the singers of the Imperial Bolshoi Theatre, as it had been then called, would be unable to feel and convey the subtle poetic substance of “Onegin” [9], since they were used to exaggerations and conventional practices of their contemporary opera.
That was why he gathered young performers, students who made up for their lack of experience with sincerity and spontaneity. Young singers lived up to Tchaikovsky’s expectations, for “Eugene Onegin”, modestly named “Lyrical Scenes” by the composer, was welcomed with delight by public reception and soon became the all-time favorite.
MOSCOW STARS
Everything vivid and noteworthy in the art of the Russian capital is gathered under the banner of “Moscow Stars” spring festival every year.
Music lovers regard the Spring Festival of Arts as a real holiday, and all visitors are sure to remember for a very long time.
On the occasion of the anniversary of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s birth the Spring Festival of 2015 was dedicated entirely to his works.
The first International Music Festival named in Tchaikovsky honour was held in Klin in 2015 [20].
“Let such such festivals be arranged as often as possible, and let them come to England too as often as they can, they will be our most welcome guests, particularly our favourite Bolshoi Theatre” [10].
A group of English chemists.
“Interest in Russian music and dancers is very intense. The Moscow arts festival is valuable firstly because it will let us learn the new names that will come in time to be renowned over the world” [10].
Alberto Soriano, Uruguayan composer.
“…The organization of the “Moscow Stars” festival is a splendid idea. The numerous admirers of great Russian art will thus be able to hear and see their favourites in a short time” [10].
Radmila Karaklaich
“Twenty years ago I was sent to Moscow as an officer of the Allied forces… That occasion was unforgettable. Today I am here again in the Bolshoi Theatre. All my impressions may be formulated the follows: the Russian theatre is the best in the world and you have every right to be proud of it.” [10].
George Grant, businessman from the USA.
SPRING ART FESTIVAL IN MOSCOW
The art festivals in Russia include “Moscow Stars” and “Russian winter” in Moscow and “White Nights” festival in Saint Petersburg.
All information about these festivals may be obtained from theatres.
The best artists and artistic organizations of Russia take part in the art festivals of Moscow and Saint Petersburg. Among them are the Bolshoi Theatre, the Opera and the Ballet Theatre of Saint Petersburg, the State Symphony Orchestra, Laureates of the International Music Contests, the Russian Choir, the State Folk Dance Ensemble of Russia, the Choreographic Ensemble, the Moscow State Circus and others [11].
Talking of russian dance schools, their aim to train not only brilliant dancers, but also highly cultured artists with broad interests and generous approach to life.
The psychologists have yet to explain how rich impressions of life are reflected in the creative endeavors of an artist. These ties are subtler and harder to perceive in ballet than, say, in literature and painting, but they too can be discerned and identified.
Yuri Zhdanov, one of the best performers of Siegfried in “Swan Lake” and also well-known painter, can be pointed out here. His paintings have been more than once exhibited in Moscow. His brother Leonid Zhdanov, also dancer at the Bolshoi Theatre, is an outstanding photographer and the author of many popular photographic albums, which depict the skill of the Bolshoi Theatre foremost artists. Equally interesting is his album on Australia, compiled of photographs he took during the Bolshoi Theatre’s guest performances there. It may be impossible to establish direct connections between the professions of the Zhdanovs and their hobbies, but audiences perceive the richness of their achievements in each field.
2.3 TCHAIKOVSKY IN OUR LIFE
WITH TCHAIKOVKY IN LIFE
The fledglings of the choreographic school traditionally participate in one of Tchaikovsky’s finest works, “The Nutcracker” ballet based on a Hoffman’s tale of the nutcracker and the mouse king [12]. The school’s concerts are as a rule included in the programme of the Moscow festivals. After attending such a concert, Vidnai Bahadu, member of the All India Congress, remarked: “The teaching of children must nurture the development of their natural gifts in every way: and the concert of the choreographic school is the most vivid and eloquent confirmation of this” [12].
The basic principles of russian choreographic school were formed in its first years of existence . The conventional language of dance was mastered by the pupils and employed as a medium telling of man’s struggle and right to happiness. Many achievements of those years later became the foundation of the school’s repertoire. Russian choreographic school, moreover, has zealously preserved the traditions introduced into Russian choreography by the ballets of Tchaikovsky, the traditions of unity between musical and plastic art. Tcescaridze and Gabovich, Svetlova and Volochkova… the list of these glorious names grows longer almost every year. For example, the very first festival “Moscow Stars” provided its guests with the opportunity to see one of the younger ballerinas, A. Volochkova. The first festival of “Moscow Stars” gave guests the opportunity to see one of the younger ballerinas, A. Volochkova.
On graduation she was immediately accepted by the Bolshoi Theatre and was a member of the troupe that toured the USA and Canada. Her role in the pas de trios in “Swan Lake” was modest enough, but she always received warm and friendly, if brief, notice from the critics. Within a year even those restrained in their praise unanimously foretold that she would become one of the greatest stars of Russian ballet.
The importance of discovering a child’s talent in early years and nurturing it is the common knowledge. The world will probably be richer in outstanding musicians than it is today when all talents ares found early and placed in conditions that encourage their formation and growth. Tuition should begin in time to develop high professional skill, and that is right not only for musicians, composers and soloists.
Tchaikovsky wrote with special zest for children. Deep and bright emotion pervades his cycle of children’s songs including sixteen splendid romances. His “Children’s Album” [13] too was compiled with the sagacity of a true teacher. Each piece moves the listener even when played by the unsteady fingers of a child, and is aimed at developing technique, imparting a feeling of rhythm and helping to mastery expression.
The number of music schools in Russia increases annually. Even more rapid, however, has been the growth in the number of families eager to give their children an all-round aesthetic education, and first and foremost to acquaint them with music. The music schools now are not aimed only to train professionals, they teach all people to read music and play musical instruments with fair competence. Alumni of music schools are well equipped with theoretical knowledge, and music is sure to form a part of their lives henceforth no matter what they do for a living.
There is no unbridgeable gap between the specialized and general music schools. This is natural, for true talent cannot always be identified in early childhood. Suffice to say that Tchaikovsky himself was thought to be endowed with but modest gifts in his early youth and that highly respected teacher urged him to abandon the idea of a musical career.
The system of musical education in Russia has been developing and improving. More and more authorities are making the claim that there are simply no untalented people where music is concerned. Teachers and psychologists have been conducting experiments with encouraging results. They have found that an ear for tone can be developed in all children, that the ability to play musical instruments can be cultivated in each and every one of them.
There has not been a single major musical competition of late in which Russian singers, pianists, violinists and cellists have failed to emerge among the winners. They have displayed a mastery of style in all forms of classical and modern music. It is with especial ardour, however, that they come to the contests around the works of Tchaikovsky which embody the very soul of Russian art [14]. The juries made up of the greatest musicians of the world have unanimously noted the depth and refinement of Russian performance and the special of these musicians to bring out the richness of works they play.
TCHAIKOVSKY IN THE CONCERT HALLS
On the walls of the Moscow Conservatoire’s Grand Hall, between the high windows hang portraits of great composers of the past: Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Glinka, Mussogorsky, Tchaikovsky, and others. All the corridors and classrooms of the Conservatoire, however, have insufficient space to display the portraits of all the composers whose music has been heard there. Music reigns supreme in both the Grand and Small Halls of the Conservatoire every evening. In these programmes Tchaikovsky is given a place of honour. One day his music may be played by the symphony orchestra and on another by violinist. The player may be Russian artist today and a guest from abroad tomorrow. The audience may be applauding an acknowledged virtuoso on one evening and students and postgraduates of the Conservatoire on the next. At the entrance, in the hubbub preceding these concerts, one invariably hears a phrase more common in Moscow than talk about the weather: “Has anybody an extra ticket”.
The State Symphony Orchestra of Russia, one of the oldest bodies of musicians in Russia [15], has been led in the Grand Hall at one time or another by nearly all the prominent conductors of our times: by K. Ivanov (whose creative bent, as is well-known, learns mainly towards Tchaikovsky), Y. Mravinsky, N. Rakhkin, N. Golovanov, W. Ferrero, H. Abendrot, and so on. Each of these unique masters has left his stamp on the performing style of the orchestra which had no rival for a long time. Its competitor, the Symphony Orchestra of the Moscow Philarmonic Society, took shape in Moscow over the past few years: and the music lovers of the capital can hardly decide which of the two they prefer.
To see crowds around the intermissions at the concerts in the Grand Hall and elsewhere is quite usual and indeed a distinctive feature of the cultural life of Moscow and other cities of Russia. These music lovers say how they liked the music they have heard, define its special qualities, and speak of how and when it was composed.
Several times each season at the Grand Hall the public is sure to be treated to the symphonies of Tchaikovsky, especially the popular Fourth, Fifth and Sixth, to his “Romeo and Juliet”, “Francesca da Rimini”, “Manfred”, pianoforte and violin concertos, songs and instrumental pieces. Russian and foreign singers, conductors, pianists and violinists are ever disclosing the subtle lyricism and inspired musical imagery of Tchaikovsky in new aspects. Music lovers are indeed enriched by the performance of every new virtuoso.
The Grand and Small Halls of the Conservatoire are not only centres of attraction for Music lovers. The resplendent Hall of Columns offers its audiences both symphony and variety concerts. This Hall is particularly dear to Muscovites for it was there that many of Tchaikovsky’s works were first played, often under the baton of the composer himself. Instrumentalists and singers like to perform too. A fresh addition is the concert hall of the Gnesin School of Music and Teaching [16].
OF WHAT GOOD IS TCHAIKOVSKY TO AN ENGINEER?
An article was published in a Moscow newspaper a few years ago under the heading “Of what Good is Tchaikovsky to an Engineer?” The article spoke of the letter whose author, a young and rather immature person, questioned the necessity of classical music to those people of the twenty-first century who had not dedicated themselves to art.
The article drew thousands of indignant replies. “Tchaikovsky is necessary, may imperative to all” anonymously fumed the students, workers, doctors, engineers and scientists. “His music helps us live, teaches us to love people, to appreciate their spiritual beauty: it confirms the invincible spirit and power of human emotion. Life would lose much of its colour without Tchaikovsky…”
“I am a teacher of electrodynamics”, declared Candidate of Technical Sciences V. Lavrov in his letter published in the newspaper. “But I love and am familiar with poetry and music. Art is part of my life. While explaining the equations of Maxwell to my students I often draw their attention to the beauty of those equations. I wish you could see how eagerly they listen to such lectures”.
“I’m an old friend of Russia,” said Professor Alex Tushko of the University of Warsaw when he came to the festival of “Moscow Stars”. “In the past few days I attended the operas “Boris Godunov” and “Don Carlos”, saw a performances of Moscow Theatres, went to the circus. I’m tremendously impressed! But I was struck mostly by for the people’s striving for art, the overcrowded halls! Russia is a country of vast culture for the people.”
The city or rather town of Electrostal, lies some two hours travel from Moscow. Its People’s Opera House sometimes stages “Eugene Onegin”. The voices are splendid, the orchestra excellent, and the production as a whole, superb. For all that there is not a single professional musician in the theatre. They are all different people – but people who have acquired great skill in amateur art circles. They differ from the professionals in that they sing and play only in the evenings. During the day they may be found at the factory bench, behind their drawing boards, teaching children at school, administering injections to the sick, or serving customers in various shops. If they are engaged in such work the reason is not that they are insufficiently talented for the professional stage, but simply that they are devoted to their own professionals a much as to music and do not want to sacrifice one interest for another.
Typical in his respect is V. Konyashin who appears in the role of Onegin. He is a vivid, temperamental singer with stage experience, a subtle musician and a gifted actor who can render his audience spellbound. At the same time, however, he is a gifted and well trained engineer in charge of a shop at one of the Electrosteel plants. Talking to him one can easily see how capacious a human life can be, how many lasting joys are accessible to a person with a creative nature.
The Russian people’s craving for an all-round and thorough understanding of the arts has prompted new and unique forms of artistic education. One of them is found in the universities of culture, and especially of musical culture. Regular attendance at these centres equips music lovers with systematized knowledge of the development of music, its genres and styles: it develops their capacity to perceive music, to read the language of musical imagery. These schools indeed gradually enable concert audiences to comprehend the most intricate professional problems.
The Russian listeners’ faculty to appraise real art has been repeatedly noted by musicians from abroad.
“Moscow and my performances on the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre will always live in my memory, in my heart!” declared the famous Italian singer Mario del Monaco. “The sensitive, highly responsive Moscow audiences react to the performance of the artists with astonishing warmth. It is a rare pleasure to meet with such a public! I’ll never forget the splendid Moscow audiences and the talented Russian artists [17].
The young musicians prepare for their crucial concert with deep agitation, but these emotions, natural in anyone entering into a creative contest of such importance, are mixed with another feeling. This was best described by the American pianists G. Edison, winner of the International Tchaikovsky Contest, when he spoke of his last rehearsal at the Grand Hall of the Conservatoire on the eve of the final round: “I remember the famous people whose music seemed but recently to have resounded within these walls: Rakhmaninov, Tchaikovsky, Skryabin, Glinka, Mussogorsky – those who created Russian music and gave it its national features. Harking to those sounds I felt as if I were little boy again, terrified to be where Rakhmaninov had studied and Tchaikovsky once taught. This compelled me to forget myself to such an extent that I overcame my fear and was not nervous any more”.
CONCLUSION
In conclusion we would like to say: we, Russians, are associated with Tchaikovsky’s music, with Tolstoy’s books: these great people are still “working”. Eternal gratitude to them for glorifying Russia – at all times.
Hearing P. I. Tchaikovsky’s music time and again, one can’t but feel that it is becoming still more significant for the world culture, and its influence is spreading further and further. And we are pleased to see youngsters eager to learn more about the inner world of the great Russian man of art. Tchaikovsky’s name is dear to us since childhood. We are listening to Tchaikovsky’s music and worship it in awe, expressing our gratitude. If you feel down, unable to cope with difficulties, then listen to Tchaikovsky’s music, his Sixth symphony – and you will probably regain strength.
The practical part of this paper included speaking with people of different professions, beliefs, opinions from all over the world. All of them have travelled hundreds of miles to get to the music festival. So, now I know two main reasons of popularity of Tchaikovsky’s music:
1. Classic music stays forever.
2. Tchaikovsky’s music is popular because cardinally different people like it.
I want to thank everyone who was at the festival with me. I hope that The International Music Festivals named in Tchaikovsky’s honour in Klin will become a good tradition.
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Электронные ресурсы:
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20. Международный музыкальный фестиваль имени Чайковского. [Электронный ресурс] – Режим доступа: http://musicklin.ru/
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