Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky:
Symphony No. 4 in F minor, Op. 36, TH 27 (with Score)
Composed: 1877-78
Conductor: Evgeny Mravinsky
Orchestra: Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra
00:00 1. Andante sostenuto - Moderato con anima (F minor)
18:45 2. Andantino in modo di Canzona (B♭ minor)
28:04 3. Scherzo. Pizzicato ostinato. Allegro (F major)
33:53 4. Finale. Allegro con fuoco (F major)
"I should not wish for symphonic works to come from my pen which express nothing and which consist of empty playing with chords, rhythms, and modulations. Should a symphony not express those things for which there are not words but which need to be expressed?" Tchaikovsky, on his F minor Symphony, in a letter to Taneyev in 1878.
All of Tchaikovsky's symphonies are wrenched from deep inside him and are titanic works of love. In his writings, he speaks of many of them as if they were living things -- the children he knew he otherwise would never have. The prince of these is the extroverted and wild Fourth Symphony.
By the end of 1876, Tchaikovsky had begun to sketch out his F minor symphony. He had also decided to marry, perhaps hoping for both social redemption and psychological catharsis. In the spring of 1877, one of his students, Antonina Milyukova, revealed herself to be hopelessly in love with him, and in July he married her. The marriage failed, and Tchaikovsky spiraled into a maelstrom of self-loathing such that he abused and then abandoned his wife, and made a half-hearted attempt at suicide. Nonetheless, Tchaikovsky continued work on the Fourth Symphony, perhaps finding escape from the misery of his life in the wonder of the music. In October of the year, his wealthy patroness, the Mme. Nadezhda von Meck, formalized a regular stipend to him. He seems to have drawn inspiration and emotional sustenance from their long-distance relationship, and by January of 1878 the work was finished.
The Fourth Symphony, although it followed the third by only three years, is suddenly decades, indeed generations ahead of the first three. Gone is Tchaikovsky's youthful naïveté, and in its place is a profound view of Man's insignificant place in a monstrous Universe. The work slams up against the boundaries of defiance, hope, resignation, and triumph and is both richly melodic and thunderously bombastic. Fate -- Tchaikovsky's lifelong adversary and tormentor -- suddenly has a voice, and it is heard in the blast of trombones, horns, and trumpets opening the symphony. Loud, insistent, devoid of warmth or vibrato, all of a note, it commands total attention and returns repeatedly throughout the first movement to quell even the briefest and most innocent passing thought of happiness. Among many candidates, this movement is one of Tchaikovsky's finest in terms of musical structure and emotional impact.
Still hopeful at the age of only 38, Tchaikovsky actually includes a movement of quiet contemplation and an incredibly effective pizzicato scherzo before setting free what may best be described as a great dervish of joy and celebration, which sweeps the listener away to breathtaking ecstasy. In Tchaikovsky's mind, no doubt this was how it had to be. As relentless and impersonal as is Fate, his defiance of and triumph over it had to be even greater. Advocates of a very few other great composers might argue, but the fact is Tchaikovsky, in his Fourth Symphony, spans Man's coming to grips with his place in the Universe as well as it has ever been done in symphonic music. The work was dedicated to von Meck but cryptically inscribed "To my best friend." The work premiered in February of 1878 in Moscow.