SYMPHONY NO. 6, IN B MINOR, “PATHETIC,” OP. 74
I. Adagio; allegro non troppo II. Allegro con grazia III. Allegro molto vivace IV. Finale: adagio lamentoso
We well remember the sensation the Sixth symphony made in Boston when Mr. Paur brought it out. When the late William Foster Apthorp described the music as “obscene,” a singular word to apply to it, indignant denunciatory letters were sent to the Evening Transcript, written by persons who, as Charles Reade once said of letter writers to newspapers, had no other waste-pipe for their intellect.
This symphony was at the first so popular that some predicted its life would be short. It is still an amazing human document. The Fifth may for some reasons be preferred as a purely musical composition; the Fourth has more of the Russian folk-spirit; but the somber eloquence of the Pathetic, its pages of recollected joys fled forever, its wild gayety quenched by the thought of the inevitable end, its mighty lamentation—these are overwhelming and shake the soul.
The first mention of the Pathetic symphony is in a letter from Tchaikovsky to his brother Anatol, dated Klin, February 22, 1893: “I am now wholly occupied with the new work (a symphony) and it is hard for me to tear myself away from it. I believe it comes into being as the best of my works. I must finish it as soon as possible, for I have to wind up a lot of affairs and I must also soon go to London. I told you that I had completed a symphony which suddenly displeased me, and I tore it up. Now I have composed a new symphony which I certainly shall not tear up.”
Returning in August from a trip to London, Peter wrote to Modeste that he was up to his neck in his symphony. “The orchestration is the more difficult, the farther I go. Twenty years ago I let myself write at ease without much thought, and it was all right. Now I have become cowardly and uncertain. I have sat the whole day over two pages; that which I wished came constantly to naught. In spite of this, I make progress.” He wrote to Davidov, August 15: “The symphony which I intended to dedicate to you—I shall reconsider this on account of your long silence—is progressing. I am very well satisfied with the contents, but not wholly with the orchestration. I do not succeed in my intentions. It will not surprise me in the least if the symphony is cursed or judged unfavorably; ’twill not be for the first time. I myself consider it the best, especially the most open-hearted of all my works. I love it as I never have loved any other of my musical creations. My life is without the charm of variety; evenings I am often bored; but I do not complain, for the symphony is now the main thing, and I cannot work anywhere so well as at home.” He wrote Jurgenson, his publisher, on August 24, that he had finished the orchestration: “I give you my word of honor that never in my life have I been so contented, so proud, so happy, in the knowledge that I have written a good piece.” It was at this time that he thought seriously of writing an opera with a text founded on The Sad Fortunes of the Reverend Mr. Barton, by George Eliot, of whose best works he was an enthusiastic admirer.
Tchaikovsky left Klin forever on October 19. He stopped at Moscow to attend a funeral, and there with Kashkin he talked freely after supper. Friends had died; who would be the next to go? “I told Peter,” said Kashkin, “that he would outlive us all. He disputed the likelihood, yet added that never had he felt so well and happy.” Peter told him that he had no doubt about the first three movements of his new symphony, but that the last was still doubtful in his mind; after the performance he might destroy it and write another finale. He arrived at St. Petersburg in good spirits, but he was depressed because the symphony made no impression on the orchestra at the rehearsals. He valued highly the opinion of players, and he conducted well only when he knew that the orchestra liked the work. He was dependent on them for the finesse of interpretation. “A cool facial expression, an indifferent glance, a yawn—these tied his hands; he lost his readiness of mind, he went over the work carelessly, and cut short the rehearsal, that the players might be freed from their boresome work.” Yet he insisted that he never had written and never would write a better composition than this symphony.
The Sixth symphony was performed for the first time at St. Petersburg, October 28, 1893. Tchaikovsky conducted. The symphony failed. “There was applause,” says Modeste, “and the composer was recalled, but with no more enthusiasm than on previous occasions. There was not the mighty, overpowering impression made by the work when it was conducted by Napravnik, November 18, 1893, and later, wherever it was played.” The critics were decidedly cool.
The morning after, Modeste found Peter at the tea-table with the score of the symphony in his hand. He regretted that, inasmuch as he had to send it that day to the publisher, he had not yet given it a title. He wished something more than “No. 6,” and did not like “Programme symphony.” “What does Programme symphony mean when I will give it no programme?” Modeste suggested “Tragic,” but Peter said that would not do. “I left the room before he had come to a decision. Suddenly I thought, ‘Pathetic.’ I went back to the room,—I remember it as though it were yesterday,—and I said the word to Peter. ‘Splendid, Modi, bravo, “Pathetic”!’ and he wrote in my presence the title that will forever remain.”
On November 1, Tchaikovsky was in perfect health. He dined with an old friend and went to the theater. In the cloakroom there was talk about spiritualism. Varlamov objected to all talk about ghosts and anything that reminded one of death. Tchaikovsky laughed at Varlamov’s manner of expression and said: “There is still time enough to become acquainted with this detestable snub-nosed one. At any rate, he will not have us soon. I know that I shall live for a long time.” He then went with friends to a restaurant, where he ate macaroni and drank white wine with mineral water. When he walked home about 2 A.M., Peter was well in body and in mind.
There are some who find pleasure in the thought that the death of a great man was in some way mysterious or melodramatic. For years some insisted that Salieri caused Mozart to be poisoned. There was a rumor after Tchaikovsky’s death that he took poison or sought deliberately the cholera. When Mr. Alexander Siloti, a pupil of Tchaikovsky, first visited Boston, in 1898, he did not hesitate to say that there might be truth in the report, and, asked as to his own belief, he shook his head with a portentous gravity that Burleigh might have envied. We have been assured by other Russians who knew Tchaikovsky that he killed himself, nor was the reason for his so doing withheld. Peter’s brother Modeste gives a circumstantial account of Peter’s death from natural causes. Peter awoke November 2 after a restless night, but he went out about noon to make a call; he returned to luncheon, ate nothing, and drank a glass of water that had not been boiled. Modeste and others were alarmed, but Peter was not disturbed, for he was less afraid of the cholera than of other diseases. Not until night was there any thought of serious illness, and then Peter said to his brother: “I think this is death. Good-bye, Modi.” At eleven o’clock that night it was determined that his sickness was cholera.
Modeste tells at length the story of Peter’s ending. Their mother had died of cholera in 1854, at the very moment that she was put into a bath. The physicians recommended as a last resort a warm bath for Peter, who, when asked if he would take one, answered: “I shall be glad to have a bath, but I shall probably die as soon as I am in the tub—as my mother died.” The bath was not given that night, the second night after the disease had been determined, for Peter was too weak. He was at times delirious, and he often repeated the name of Mme von Meck in reproach or in anger, for he had been sorely hurt by her sudden and capricious neglect after her years of interest and devotion. The next day the bath was given. A priest was called, but it was not possible to administer the Communion, and he spoke words that the dying man could no longer understand. “Peter Ilitch suddenly opened his eyes. There was an indescribable expression of unclouded consciousness. Passing over the others standing in the room, he looked at the three nearest him, and then toward heaven. There was a certain light for a moment in his eyes, which was soon extinguished, at the same time with his breath. It was about three o’clock in the morning.”
What was the programme in Tchaikovsky’s mind? Kashkin says that, if the composer had disclosed it to the public, the world would not have regarded the symphony as a kind of legacy from one filled with a presentiment of his own approaching end; that it seems more reasonable “to interpret the overwhelming energy of the third movement and the abysmal sorrow of the finale in the broader light of a national or historical significance rather than to narrow them to the expression of an individual experience. If the last movement is intended to be predictive, it is surely of things vaster and issues more fatal than are contained in a mere personal apprehension of death. It speaks rather of a ‘lamentation large et souffrance inconnue,’ and seems to set the seal of finality on all human hopes. Even if we eliminate the purely subjective interest, this autumnal inspiration of Tchaikovsky, in which we hear ‘the ground whirl of the perished leaves of hope, still remains the most profoundly stirring of his works.’ ...”