Run Time: Approx. 44 minutes

One of the great struggles of Tchaikovsky’s musical life was the conflict he felt between the Western classical tradition in which he was trained and the Eastern European folk traditions that he grew up with and felt deeply connected to. Later in his life, when he reached the height of his compositional maturity, he achieved a balance between these opposing influences, blending them into a truly unique voice that produced  some of the most beloved and well-known music in the classical repertoire. This is the Tchaikovsky we know from the great ballets Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, and The Nutcracker, not to mention his final three symphonies. Hardly a year passes without most orchestras performing one of them.

His first symphony, however, comes from a different stage of his life. He was a newly minted professor of harmony at the brand new St. Petersburg Conservatory, and had only recently begun composing seriously. In this seminal work, you can hear him working through this conflict, exploring both voices, and working out how to bring them together.

There are many differences between the musical traditions of Eastern and Western Europe, but the most significant is the emphasis on structure versus melody. This difference is akin to a poet being focused more on the use of a specific rhyme scheme versus the meaning and sound of the particular words chosen. Western classical music is highly focused on form—both the architecture of the piece and the way that harmonies progress from one to another. Russian music, in contrast, is more concerned with melodic and dramatic expression. It tends to favor slightly different scales, asymmetrical folk-inspired meters, and often repeats melodic material with a new accompaniment, rather than developing a melody as is typical of Western tradition.

Perhaps as a nod to his Russian roots, Tchaikovsky gave his first foray into symphonic writing the subtitle “Winter Daydreams.” While not programmatic per se, the title does evoke an otherworldliness that the music echoes, like stepping into the inside of a snow globe. But even in this fantasyland, there is a hint of melancholy that so often pervades nineteenth-century Russian art.

The conflict between Tchaikovsky’s musical influences is most apparent in the symphony’s outer movements. The first movement begins with a theme in the flute and bassoon that has a distinctly folk-like feel before adding more rhythmic march-like material to his opening. Later, a triumphant theme emerges, closer to what you might expect from a typical Romantic-era symphony, which is contrasted by a minor section that feels unmistakably Russian. Here, the contrast between the two styles is quite striking, whereas in his later compositions, Tchaikovsky blends these influences more seamlessly.

The final movement opens with a distinctly Russian-flavored introduction before shifting into a more conventional Romantic-era style. The next theme, however, leans back into more Russian sounding motifs—but then Tchaikovsky develops it into a fugue, a Baroque form that represents perhaps the epitome of Western classical compositional technique. He’s clearly experimenting here, and it’s fascinating, if a little unusual. It doesn’t quite sound like the Tchaikovsky we know and love yet, but you can hear the composer he is on his way to becoming.

Upon the work’s premiere, the second movement earned particular praise with critics, and for good reason. Here, Tchaikovsky settles fully into his Russian roots, and in doing so displays his gift for melody. The plaintive tune, first introduced by the oboe, remains largely unchanged throughout the movement; it’s the accompaniment, the shifting colors, moods, and the contrasting voices around it that carry the music through an entire world of sound. This is a distinctly Eastern European approach, one that Tchaikovsky would go on to use to great effect in many of his later works.