Tschaikowsky Sinfonie Nr 4 Semyon Bychkov WDR Sinfonieorchester

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Symphony No. 4 in F minor op. 36 by Peter Tchaikovsky, played by the WDR Symphony Orchestra under the baton of its then principal conductor Semyon Bychkov. Recorded live at the Kölner Philharmonie on 19.09.2008. Historical recording from the WDR Klassik Archive. • 00:00:00 I. Andante sostenuto - Moderato con anima - Moderato assai, quasi Andante - Allegro con anima • 00:18:26 II. Andantino in modo di canzona • 00:29:07 III. scherzo: pizzicato ostinato. Allegro • 00:34:45 IV. Finale. Allegro con fuoco • WDR Symphony Orchestra • Semyon Bychkov, conductor • ► More about the symphony orchestra, concerts and current livestreams at https://www.wdr-sinfonieorchester.de • ► The WDR Symphony Orchestra on Facebook / wdrsinfonieorchester • Work introduction • Tchaikovsky, a Mozart fan, wrote off his own distress with the Fourth Symphony, written at a fateful turn in his life. • In Peter Tchaikovsky's eyes, Anatoly Lyadov belonged to the wrong party - namely, the St. Petersburg circle around Mussorgsky and Borodin, which called itself the Russian Five or Mighty Group and was committed to strengthening national traditions, but which Tchaikovsky regarded as a dilettante association. In turn, Tchaikovsky, who worked in Moscow, was resented by the Five as a decadent Westerner . But Tchaikovsky revised his negative opinion of Lyadov and met him personally in 1887. Since then they visited each other more often, perhaps as kindred spirits in depressive and hypersensitive traits. • Unlike Lyadov, however, Tchaikovsky forged extensive masterpieces out of inner crises. Obliviousness was not his thing. The fact that Tchaikovsky feverishly hurled out three major works in just two years of extreme mental tension is nothing short of a miracle: Eugene Onegin , the Violin Concerto and the Fourth Symphony are the harvest of 1877/78, his personal catastrophe years. In July 1877, he married the young Antonina Miljukowa - against his homosexual disposition. After a few weeks, the sham marriage ended in disaster; Tchaikovsky attempted suicide. Large parts of the Fourth had already been composed. He was able to complete the symphony in January 1878, always in close correspondence with his patron Nadeshda von Meck, who had entered his life a year earlier and to whom he dedicated the new work as his best friend . • Nadeshda von Meck was also the addressee of the famous programme Tchaikovsky gave his Fourth after its premiere in February 1878. It led to its later popular designation as the Fate Symphony . The composer characterised the massive fanfare of the opening bars as Fatum : as a fatal power that prevents our pursuit of happiness, a power that hovers over our heads like a sword of Damocles and incessantly poisons our souls. The motif, blasted out fortissimo by horns and bassoons, is initially determined entirely by the triplet rhythm with almost frozen melodic movement - much like the motif of Hunding, the bourgeois antagonist of free love and passion in Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung . The scale crash of the Fatum fanfare, supported by trombones and tuba, is reminiscent of the contract motif from the Ring , i.e. that sound symbol which, like Hunding's motif, stands for the unbending nature of law and justice. A coincidence? In 1876, a year before he began composing the Fourth, Tchaikovsky attended the first Bayreuth Festival and heard the Ring tetralogy, albeit with little enthusiasm. Perhaps it was the daring of the Wälsungen couple to leave conventions behind through a love that broke all bonds that burned into him. Tchaikovsky himself never dared to do this in life. • With a restless waltz and a tender clarinet cantilena, according to the programme fleeting dreams of happiness , the actual themes of the extended opening movement are established. The songlike melody of the second movement, first intoned by the oboe, then by the cellos, has something Schubertian in its oscillation between lyricism and melancholy - sad and sweet at the same time , as the programme says. The contrast between the burlesque pizzicato of the strings in the scherzo and the folkloristic wind melodies in the trio is captivating. While folk song motifs are already reminiscent in this movement, the finale, which begins with dance-like verve, decidedly uses a Russian folk song, Auf dem Feld steht eine Birke ( There's a birch tree in the field ). The song sings of a wedding custom of young girls, of all things. It begins gracefully in oboes and bassoons, but soon grows into obstinate menace in the brass. An ecstatic whirl sweeps everything away. Tchaikovsky's last sentence in the explanatory note for his patroness: Rejoice in the happiness of others. Life can become more bearable. • (Text: Kerstin Schüssler-Bach)

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