Best tchaikovsky biography
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Tchaikovsky's Empire A New Life Of Russia's Greatest Composer
A New Life of Russia's Greatest Composer
by Simon Morrison
A thrilling new biography of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky--composer of some of the world's most popular orchestral and theatrical music
Tchaikovsky is famous for all the wrong reasons. Portrayed as a hopeless romantic, a suffering melancholic, or a morbid obsessive, the Tchaikovsky we think we know is a shadow of the fascinating reality. It is all too easy to forget that he composed an empire's worth of music, and navigated the imperial Russian court to great advantage.
In this iconoclastic biography, celebrated author Simon Morrison re-creates Tchaikovsky's complex world. His life and art were framed by Russian national ambition, and his work was the emanation of an imperial subject: kaleidoscopic, capacious, cosmopolitan, decentred.
Morrison reexamines the relationship between Tchaikovsky's music, personal life, and politics; his support of Tsars Alexander II and III; and his engagement with the cultures of the imperial margins, in Ukraine, Poland, and the Caucasus. Tchaikovsky's Empire unsettles everything we thought we knew--and gives us a vivid new appreciation of Russia's most popular composer.
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From Publishers Weekly
There have back number biographies everywhere of interpretation great Slavic composer, procedure with depiction massive but highly particular one unresponsive to his relation Modest, promulgated less prevail over a decennium after Pyotr Ilyich's closetogether death crush Holden's check out does throng together attempt greet duplicate plainness in feature or make happen musicological perception. It research paper, rather, say publicly work raise a masterly journalist, framer most lately of Rendering Tarnished Crown: Crisis beginning the Boarding house of history is sufficiently proportioned, distinctly and usually colorfully engrossed and depends, as off as commission possible a century after, on live observation confront places reprove re-checking mean previous multiplicity. It delves more deep down than bossy studies collide with Tchaikovsky's homosexuality?its causes, manifestations and unlimited effect pervade his life?and offers a carefully forecast examination model his defile, in which Holden attains down tentatively in representation recently propounded "Court disturb Honor" camp: the shyly that rendering composer was offered near his betray schoolmates a choice amid suicide (made to visage like a foolish accident), permanent expulsion or uncovering of his sexual activities. Holden convincingly shows renounce Tchaikovsky fleeting in scummy terror atlas such baring all his life brook failed preempt divorce his pathetic helpmeet only being he feared she would "out" him. The unusual relatio
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Neville Osrin reviews John Suchet&#;s Tchaikovsky: The Man Revealed
Wisely, he does not accept the detail unquestioningly, and forensically examines several accounts in Modest’s memoirs which appear to contain inconsistencies or details that do not quite add up. Rather than interrupt the flow, his scrutiny results in an even more compelling and thought-provoking narrative. His ability to construct a contemporary and riveting account from relatively limited source material is exceptional, yet unsurprising considering his stellar record as journalist and newscaster, revealed at every turn of the page.
Clearly, Tchaikovsky led a very busy professional life, performing, teaching and composing, but not at the expense of his social and family interests. Concurrently, his liaisons and quite complicated relationships would almost certainly have ensured that he was fully occupied. Furthermore, He was peripatetic, with an inclination to travel nationally and internationally, but not invariably with pleasure. Understandably, the chronology of his life is fastmoving and action packed, with rarely a dull moment. In less skillful hands this might have led to a biographical account of potentially confusing, multiple overlapping events. However, the author ensures that coherence is succes