World Premiere: May 1, 1886
Most Recent HSO Performance: February 12, 2017
Instrumentation: 2 flutes, piccolo, 2 oboe, English horn, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, 1 tuba, timpani, bass drum, cymbals, strings
Duration: 19'

Romeo and Juliet, Fantasy-Overture (1869)

Romeo and Juliet was written when Tchaikovsky was 29. It was his first masterpiece. For a decade, he had been involved with the financial, personal and artistic struggles that mark the maturing years of most creative figures, and advice and guidance often flowed his way during that time. One who dispensed it freely (to anyone who would listen) was Mili Balakirev, one of the group of amateur composers known in English as “The Five” (and in Russian as “The Mighty Handful”) who sought to create a nationalistic music specifically Russian in style. In May 1869, Balakirev suggested to Tchaikovsky that Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet would be an appropriate subject for a musical composition, and he even offered the young composer a detailed program and an outline for the musical form of the work. Tchaikovsky took the advice to heart and consulted closely with Balakirev during the composition of the work. Though his help came close to meddling, Balakirev’s influence seems to have had a strong positive effect on the finished composition.

Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet is among the most successful reconciliations in the orchestral repertory of a specific literary program with the requirements of logical musical structure. The work is in a carefully constructed sonata form, with introduction and coda. The slow opening section, in chorale style, depicts Friar Lawrence. The exposition (Allegro giusto) begins with a vigorous, syncopated theme depicting the conflict between the Montagues and the Capulets. The melee subsides and a lyrical theme (used here as a contrasting second subject) is sung by the English horn to represent Romeo’s passion; a tender, sighing phrase for muted violins suggests Juliet’s response. A stormy development section utilizing the driving main theme and music from the introduction denotes the continuing feud between the families and Friar Lawrence’s urgent pleas for peace. The crest of the fight ushers in the recapitulation, which is a considerably compressed version of the exposition. Juliet’s sighs again provoke the ardor of Romeo, whose motive is given a grand setting that marks the work’s emotional high point. The tempo slows, the mood darkens, and the coda emerges with the sense of impending doom. The themes of the conflict and of Friar Lawrence’s entreaties sound again, but a funereal drum beats out the cadence of the lovers’ fatal pact. Romeo’s motto appears for a final time in a poignant transformation before the closing woodwind chords evoke visions of the flight to celestial regions.

©2023 Dr. Richard E. Rodda