In 1890 Tschaikowsky celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary of his musical activity and was honored with the degree of Doctor of Music by Cambridge University. He made a tour of America, of which he spoke in high terms as a country of new beauties and new life. One of his remarks is characteristic. 'The rush and roar of that wild freedom of America still haunts me. It is like fifty orchestras combined. Although you do not see any Indians running about the streets of New York, yet their spirit has put a stamp on its whole life. It is in the everlasting activity and the stoic attitude toward what we call fate.'
One of the peculiar traits of Tschaikowsky was his indifference to his creations after they had been produced. He even disliked to hear them and always found fault with his early compositions, especially with his operas; yet he did not know how he could have improved them. Exceptions, however, were his Fourth and Sixth Symphonies, his 'Eugen Onegin,' Sérénade Mélancholique, his Concerto in D, and a few other compositions. While working upon his favorite opera he was also engaged upon his Fourth Symphony. When 'Eugen Onegin' was first performed in Moscow, Tschaikowsky whispered to Rubinstein, who was next to him in the audience: 'This and the Fourth Symphony are the decisive works of my career. If they fail I am a failure.'
Tschaikowsky died suddenly, October 25, 1893, in St. Petersburg—of cholera, as it was said officially. But according to men who knew him intimately he poisoned himself. This, we may be sure, is one of the secrets sealed by Kashkin.
Tschaikowsky was one of the greatest masters of the orchestra the world has seen. In effects of striking brilliance and of sombreness he is equally successful, and it is no doubt in a great measure on account of this Slavic splendor that his orchestral works have won the public. Yet he is far more than a colorist. His mastery over orchestral polyphony is supreme. There is always movement in his music, a rising and falling of all the parts, a complicated interweaving, never with the loss of sonority and richness. He is a great harmonist as well and an irresistible melodist. His rhythms are full of life, whether they are march, waltz or barbarous wild dances. The movement in five-four time in the Sixth Symphony is in itself a masterpiece and has stimulated countless efforts in the directions to which it pointed. It must be admitted that melody, harmony, and rhythm, all bear the stamp of the Slavic temperament, and, in so far as they are Slavic or racial, they are vigorous and healthy; but often Tschaikowsky becomes morbidly subjective, is obviously not master of his mood, but slave to it. Hence, after frequent hearings, there comes a weight upon the listener, an intangible oppression which he would be glad to avoid, but which cannot be shaken off. One detects the line of the individual and forgets the splendor of the race.
Yet through Tschaikowsky the glories of Russian music were revealed to the general public. He occupies a double position, as a Russian and as a strange individuality, whose influence has been pronounced upon modern music. The Russian composers unquestionably hold a conspicuous place among those composers who have been specially gifted to hear new possibilities of orchestral sound and to add to the splendor of orchestral music. Many of them denied Wagner. The question of how far the peculiar powers of the orchestra have been developed by them independently of Wagner, with results in many ways similar, may become the source of much speculation. It is quite possible that, thanks to their own racial sensitiveness, they have devised a brilliant orchestration similar but unrelated to Wagner.
I. N.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] Established by the Imperial Musical Society in 1862.
[9] Kashkin: 'Life of Tschaikowsky' (in Russian).