Piotr Ilitch Tchaïkovski (1840–1893)

The son of a mining engineer, Tchaikovsky first studied law and worked at the Ministry of Justice. He then entered the brand-new St Petersburg Conservatory and taught harmony at the Moscow Conservatory from 1866.

From 1877 the financial support of his patron Nadezhda von Meck allowed him to devote himself to composition. He wrote works that became universal: the Piano Concerto No. 1, the Violin Concerto, the opera Eugene Onegin, the ballets Swan Lake, The Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker, and six symphonies, the last being the “Pathétique”. He died in St Petersburg in 1893, a few days after its premiere.

His solo piano music is less known but precious: The Seasons Op. 37a, twelve pieces, one for each month, and the Album for the Young Op. 39 (1878), twenty-four easy pieces inspired by Schumann’s Album for the Young.

Tchaikovsky teaches pianists to sing long melodies, to capture the character of dances (waltz, mazurka, polka) and marches, and to think of the piano as a ballet orchestra.