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Home , Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

APRIL 2020

RACHMANINOFF AND TCHAIKOVSKY APRIL 17 – 19, 2020 MASTERWORKS #7: Two Russian , teacher and pupil, both legends in the world of classical and revered by their countrymen, shared something else in common: periods of severe and crippling depression.

Dr. Richard Kogan, a Juilliard-trained pianist, lonely 14-year old into despair.x He mourned the loss graduate of Harvard College and Medical School, of his mother for the rest of his life and called it the and a Clinical Professor of Psychology on the faculty most “crucial event” he’d ever experienced.xi With of the Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York City, his mother’s death, a young Tchaikovsky became has concluded that a disproportionate number of the parent figure for his younger twin brothers, the great composers of suffered from Anatoly and Modest.xii Despite the family’s wish that mental illness.i In his years as a student, Dr. Kogan Tchaikovsky have a career in the Ministry of Justice, pursued both music and pre-medical studies. His the young man was drawn to music. When the St. roommate at Harvard was famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma, Petersburg Conservatory opened its doors in 1862, and, with violinist Lynn Chang, they performed as a Tchaikovsky was among its first students.xiii From that trio.ii With a choice between music and medicine, point forward, his musical path was clear, and his Dr. Kogan chose medicine, but, in so doing, noted work as a earned him a teaching position the close relationship between the two fields.iii In at the Conservatory. interviews, he observed that Apollo was the Greek god of music and medicine and that shamans have Although the topic of Tchaikovsky’s homosexuality long moved between the worlds of healing and was suppressed in Soviet , his sexual music.iv Dr. Kogan regularly performs as a musician orientation is indisputable, according to the and in interpreting the great works of the composers autobiographical account of his brother, Modest, as both musician and physician, his priority is who was also gay.xiv Through letters between destigmatizing mental disorders.v After all, he notes, Tchaikovsky and his two younger brothers, we now “If geniuses can have mental illness, then maybe know of the heart-wrenching stress the composer mental illness is not shameful.”vi endured as a closeted homosexual, in persistent fear of a public scandal. After a series of affairs that Since ancient times, the link between creative genius included Valdimir Shilovsky (the and mental illness has been observed, and modern stepson of Valdimir Behichev, research suggests that, when compared with the the director of repertory general population, the incidence of psychiatric for the Moscow theaters),xv illness is greater among writers, artists and Tchaikovsky fell deeply in love musicians.vii and Pyotr Ilyich with Joseph Kotek, a violinist Tchaikovsky, both subjects of extensive study by Dr. and former student at the Kogan, battled a lifelong struggle with depression. .xvi When Kotek proved to be unfaithful, Tchaikovsky, born May 7, 1840 into a Tchaikovsky, then 37 and under family of relative privilege, formed social pressure to marry, hurled Tchaikovsky and Ivanova his earliest musical impressions himself into a hasty marriage from the family’s orchestrion, which with a former female student, Antonina Ivanova.xvii played excerpts from Mozart, The marriage was a disaster that ended after just two Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti.viii He months.xviii In despair, Tchaikovsky walked into the began to study piano at age five, freezing waters of the Neva River and attempted to xix Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky but, despite his early interest in commit suicide by freezing himself to death. He music, the family had him enroll was luckily rescued by passersby who witnessed the as a boarding student in the Imperial School of event.xx Jurisprudence, a path to a solid career as a civil servant.ix In 1854, in the midst of his schooling, his mother’s sudden death from cholera plunged the continued on next page... RACHMANINOFF AND TCHAIKOVSKY • APRIL 17 - 19, 2020

Though he and Antonina never again lived together, that year, there was considerable improvement in they did remain legally married until the composer’s Rachmaninoff’s appetite and mood.xxxv The composer death, and her occasional letters to him plunged was sufficiently recovered him into an even deeper state of despair, marked by to start work on his second periods of loss of sleep, loss of appetite, an inability to piano , and the work, and a fixation on imminent death.xxi His failed piece was dedicated to Dr. marriage caused Tchaikovsky extreme anxiety, and, Nikolai Dahl. The successful in correspondence with his brothers, he expressed psychiatric treatment his constant state of deep depression, exacerbated helped Rachmaninoff by the terror that his wife might expose his sexual flourish as a composer, Rachmaninoff and Dahl orientation.xxii Tchaikovsky suffered from severe and remarked that it was “as if untreated depression for the remainder of his life.xxiii he had transitioned from using watercolors to oil Meeting strangers caused him intolerable agony, paintings.”xxxvi and he was so convinced that his head would fall off while that, when he stood on the podium, After the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, Rachmaninoff he held his head with one hand and conducted the fled Russia and eventually settled in New York with the other.xxiv City where he developed a successful career as a brilliant concert pianist.xxxvii Despite his success, Sergei Rachmaninoff, born in 1873, which included a devoted wife and family, along was the son of a wealthy landowner with wealth and worldwide fame, Rachmaninoff who squandered nearly his entire continued to suffer with depression, and, as he grew fortune through gambling.xxv The older, he developed a multitude of phobias about family was forced to move to a strangers, darkness and small animals.xxxviii He openly cramped apartment in St. Petersburg acknowledged that he suffered from mental illness, in the midst of a diphtheria epidemic, but never again sought psychiatric treatment.xxxix and 9-year old Sergei fell ill, as did Dr. Kogan theorizes that Rachmaninoff was not his sister.xxvi His sister’s death from motivated to seek treatment because he believed Sergei Rachmaninoff the disease left Sergei with a fear that he sought Dr. Dahl’s treatment to cure writer’s of death that lasted throughout his lifetime.xxvii As block, not depression.xl Rachmaninoff continued to an undisciplined but talented young pianist, he concertize throughout his life, even when diagnosed was sent to study in Moscow and, as a composition with malignant melanoma. He died just 4 days short student at the Moscow Conservatory, he studied of his 70th birthday, on March 28, 1943, in Beverly Hills, with Tchaikovsky, his musical idol.xxviii In recognition California. of Sergei’s gift for composing emotionally charged music, Tchaikovsky effectively anointed Rachmaninoff The magnificent music of Tchaikovsky and as his successor.xxix After Tchaikovsky’s unexpected Rachmaninoff defies the pain they endured during death in 1893, Rachmaninoff was determined to their lives and remains as an enduring tribute to the honor his mentor and began to compose a , remarkable human ability to overcome seemingly believing it would live up to Tchaikovsky’s legacy.xxx insurmountable obstacles. But the world premiere of his Symphony No. 1 was an utter disaster. The orchestra failed to sufficiently rehearse and the conductor, , was reportedly drunk during the concert.xxxi According to Dr. Kogan, Rachmaninoff “always” had a “gloomy disposition,” and the disastrous performance of his first symphony precipitated an emotional crisis that plunged the composer into a depressive episode that nearly ended his career as a composer.xxxii Rachmaninoff developed insomnia, lost his appetite and was completely unable to compose.xxxiii JoinPlease join us! the Hartford Symphony Orchestra for When the London Philharmonic Society commissioned Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff to compose a new , he accepted the assignment because he needed April 17 - 19, 2020, to hear the money, but, at the time, he was still in despair soloist Henry Kramer perform and suffering from complete writer’s block.xxxiv In Rachmaninoff’s Piano desperation, he consulted with Dr. Nikolai Dahl, who used hypnosis for the treatment of psychiatric Concerto No. 3, in concert with problems. Rachmaninoff saw Dr. Dahl on a daily Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5. basis beginning in January of 1900 and by April of RACHMANINOFF AND TCHAIKOVSKY • APRIL 17 - 19, 2020

WONDERING HOW THE MUSIC WILL SOUND? Try HSO’S Listening Guide, with links to the pieces you’ll hear on our concert stage – and more!

Yefim Bronfman performs Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with the , conducted by : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFkAwFDZGHk Leonard Bernstein conducts the Boston Symphony in a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2JBT0HC98I Rachmaninoff’s Hands Interested in hearing more samples? Listen as Rachmaninoff performs his own Piano Concerto No. 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oA0kXDMKiLg See Dr. Kogan perform Rachmaninoff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_ continue=6&v=Z8hRBUzAeJs&feature=emb_logo Another composer who famously suffered from mental Tchaikovsky Monument in Moscow illness is , and Martha Argerich’s performance of Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A minor is filled with the magic of his music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ynky7qoPnUU

Rachmaninoff in Concert

THE HSO’S MASTERWORKS SERIES IS SPONSORED BY: Did you borrow this Prelude? Get your own free copy! Whether you’re a ticket buyer, donor, curious about the music, or know someone who is, just send an email to rsovronsky@ hartfordsymphony.org. We’ll make sure you receive Prelude by email, in advance of each HSO Masterworks concert! REFERENCES xl. xxxix. xxxviii. xxxvii. xxxvi. xxxv. xxxiv. xxxiii. xxxii. xxxi. xxx. xxix. xxviii. xxvii. xxvi. xxv. xxiv. xxiii. xxii. Ibid xxi. xx. xix. xviii. xvii. xvi. xv. xiv. xiii. xii. xi. x. ix. viii. vii. vi. v. iv. iii. ii. i.

Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid https://www.lookandlearn.com/blog/31/tchaikovskys-attempted-suicide/ https://www.classicfm.com/composers/tchaikovsky/guides/tchaikovsky-facts/depression/ https://courses.lumenlearning.com/musicapp_historical/chapter/tchaikovsky/ Ibid https://www.lookandlearn.com/blog/31/tchaikovskys-attempted-suicide/ Ibid https://courses.lumenlearning.com/musicapp_historical/chapter/tchaikovsky/ http://en.tchaikovsky-research.net/pages/Tchaikovsky:_A_Life https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/08/sorry-russia-tchaikovsky-was-definitely-gay/311805/ Ibid http://en.tchaikovsky-research.net/pages/Tchaikovsky:_A_Life https://courses.lumenlearning.com/musicapp_historical/chapter/tchaikovsky/ Ibid Ibid http://en.tchaikovsky-research.net/pages/Tchaikovsky:_A_Life https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/cultural-psychiatry/creativity-and-mental-illness-richard-kogan-rachmaninoff Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid https://www.huffpost.com/entry/music-madness-and-medicin_b_852867 https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/cultural-psychiatry/creativity-and-mental-illness-richard-kogan-rachmaninoff Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid Ibid https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/cultural-psychiatry/creativity-and-mental-illness-richard-kogan-rachmaninoff Ibid RACHMANINOFF ANDTCHAIKOVSKY•APRIL17-19,2020 executed version by andtheCleveland Orchestra (SONY). the direct opposite ofthat approach, atightlycontrolled, compelling andbrilliantly conductor itseemsontheedgeofescapingboundsscore (DG), and Philharmonic Orchestra, areading where theorchestra issosuper-charged by the but two recordings stand outaspersonalfavorites: Mravinsky andtheLeningrad Every great andnotgreat conductor hasrecorded Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5, Berlin RadioSymphony Orchestra (DECCA). apparent easethat MarthaArgerich, accompanied by Riccardo Chaillyandthe the skillsofgreatest pianists, butnonehassurmounted itsdifficultieswithmore mostRachmaninoff’s challengingpiano concerto, theNo. 3inDMinor, has tested our upcoming Masterworks Concert. house audiophile, offers his recording recommendations ofselections featured in program? Coleman Casey, HSO’s dearfriend,Director Emeritusandbeloved in- Want thebest recordings ofthepieces you’ll experience ontheconcert