Pyotr  IIyich Tchaikovsky

                            by  Danae Manta ,Grade A-Advanced 

       Pyotr  IIyich  Tchaikovsky   is  widely considered the most popular  Russian  composer  in history.He  was born on May 7,1840,in  Vyatka,Russia.When  he was just five years old,Tchaikovsky  began taking piano lessons .Although he  displayed an early passion for music,his parents  hoped that he would grow up to work in the civil service.At the age of 10,Tchaikovsky began attending the Imperial School  of Jurisprudence,a  boarding school in St Petersburg.His  mother ,Alexandra died  when he was 14 years old.

    When  he was 21,Tchaikovsky  decided to take music lessons at the Russian Musical Society.A few months later ,he enrolled at the newly founded St Petersburg Conservatory ,becoming  one of the school’s first  composition students.In addition to learning,while at the conservatory,Tchaikovsky gave private lessons to other students.

   In 1863 ,he moved to Moscow ,where he became a professor of harmony at the Moscow Conservatory.He married a young music student named Antonina Milyukova.The marriage was a catastrophe ,with Tchaikovsky abandoning his wife within weeks of the wedding.During a nervous breakdown,he unsuccessfully  attempted to commit suicide and eventually fled abroad.

His work was first publicly performed in 1865,his First  Symphony was well received.

In 1874,he established himself with Piano Concerto No1.

    Tchaikovsky  resigned from the Moscow Conservatory in 1878 and spent the rest of  his career composing yet more prolifically.In 1876 ,he completed the ballet ‘Swan Lake’ , as well as the fantasy ‘Francesca da Rimini’ .

  Tchaikovsky resigned from the Moscow Conservatory to focus his efforts entirely on composing.As  a  result,he spent the remainder of his  career composing more prolifically than ever.His collective body of work constitutes of 169 pieces ,including symphonies ,operas,ballets,concertos and songs.Among  his most famed late works are the ballets ‘The Sleeping Beauty’ (1890)  and the ‘Nutcracker’ (1892).

     Tchaikovsky died in St Petersburg on November 6th ,1893.