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PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY
Polonaise from Eugene Onegin

Tchaikovsky’s understandable reluctance to tackle Eugene Onegin as an opera came from the fact that Alexander Pushkin’s verse novel was one of the most esteemed works of 19th-century Russian literature. Moreover, without Pushkin’s literary gifts for language and description, the simple story itself was fairly unimaginative. Musicologist Richard Taruskin notes that the “plot as such was slender and banal: A dreamy country girl falls in love with a young fop from the big city; she impulsively pours out her feelings to him in a letter; she is rebuffed and humiliated; five years later the two encounter one another again and the fop is smitten; by now the country girl has become a society matron who will not abandon her husband for her old love.” Yet Taruskin goes on to observe that Tchaikovksy successfully found musical analogies to Pushkin’s narrative and brilliantly transferred subtle literary characterizations into compelling music.

Tchaikovsky wrote the opera quickly, in about eight months, at a fraught period in his life. (His Fourth Symphony dates from around the same time in 1878.) Already famous in his own country, in Europe, and beyond, the homosexual composer entered into a disastrous marriage with a young admirer and former pupil, Antonia Ivanovna Milyukova. The union lasted just a matter of weeks (although the couple never divorced), and in its aftermath Tchaikovsky set to work in earnest on Onegin. The first performance was given in March 1879 by students at the Moscow Conservatory under the direction of Nicolai Rubinstein; a professional premiere at the Bolshoi followed nearly two years later.

As in so much of his music, no matter the genre, Tchaikovsky fills his work with the spirit of dance. He adds folk choruses and dances not found in Pushkin, infusing the opera with a vital Russian flavor. The Polonaise we hear tonight opens the third and final act. Eugene Onegin has returned to St. Petersburg and is attending a grand ball in the house of Prince Gremin, a distant relative of his. It is at this event that he will encounter once again a somewhat older and by now far more sophisticated Tatiana, who is married to Gremin. The buoyant dance sets the stage for their reunion. Trumpets establish the distinctive triple-meter accompanimental rhythm characteristic of the polonaise before the full orchestra takes up more elaborate themes. The dance is in ABA form, with an intimate middle section featuring woodwinds and a long-breathed cello melody.

                                                                     —Christopher H. Gibbs

 

 

PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY
Polonaise from Eugene Onegin

Tchaikovsky’s understandable reluctance to tackle Eugene Onegin as an opera came from the fact that Alexander Pushkin’s verse novel was one of the most esteemed works of 19th-century Russian literature. Moreover, without Pushkin’s literary gifts for language and description, the simple story itself was fairly unimaginative. Musicologist Richard Taruskin notes that the “plot as such was slender and banal: A dreamy country girl falls in love with a young fop from the big city; she impulsively pours out her feelings to him in a letter; she is rebuffed and humiliated; five years later the two encounter one another again and the fop is smitten; by now the country girl has become a society matron who will not abandon her husband for her old love.” Yet Taruskin goes on to observe that Tchaikovksy successfully found musical analogies to Pushkin’s narrative and brilliantly transferred subtle literary characterizations into compelling music.

Tchaikovsky wrote the opera quickly, in about eight months, at a fraught period in his life. (His Fourth Symphony dates from around the same time in 1878.) Already famous in his own country, in Europe, and beyond, the homosexual composer entered into a disastrous marriage with a young admirer and former pupil, Antonia Ivanovna Milyukova. The union lasted just a matter of weeks (although the couple never divorced), and in its aftermath Tchaikovsky set to work in earnest on Onegin. The first performance was given in March 1879 by students at the Moscow Conservatory under the direction of Nicolai Rubinstein; a professional premiere at the Bolshoi followed nearly two years later.

As in so much of his music, no matter the genre, Tchaikovsky fills his work with the spirit of dance. He adds folk choruses and dances not found in Pushkin, infusing the opera with a vital Russian flavor. The Polonaise we hear tonight opens the third and final act. Eugene Onegin has returned to St. Petersburg and is attending a grand ball in the house of Prince Gremin, a distant relative of his. It is at this event that he will encounter once again a somewhat older and by now far more sophisticated Tatiana, who is married to Gremin. The buoyant dance sets the stage for their reunion. Trumpets establish the distinctive triple-meter accompanimental rhythm characteristic of the polonaise before the full orchestra takes up more elaborate themes. The dance is in ABA form, with an intimate middle section featuring woodwinds and a long-breathed cello melody.

                                                                     —Christopher H. Gibbs