Jonas Vitaud, the pianist on this album, was a student of Brigitte Engerer, who had studied in Moscow with Stanislas Neuhaus and was an expert on the Russian repertoire, especially Tchaikovsky.
Compositional Technique
The publisher of The Seasons, Op. 37a, added poetic epigraphs from Russian writers like Pushkin and Koltsov to each piece, illustrating the monthly publications.
Critical Reception
Tchaikovsky himself called his Grande Sonate Op. 37 "one of my least lovable children" and a "dry and complicated" piece.
Composition History
Tchaikovsky initially struggled with the sonata genre, abandoning his first attempt in 1863 and refusing to publish another piano sonata composed two years later.
Composition History
Tchaikovsky composed The Seasons, Op. 37a, as a monthly commission for the Russian periodical Nuvellist between 1875 and 1876, while worried about concealing his homosexuality and short of money.
Composer's Artistic Vision
Tchaikovsky's Grande Sonate Op. 37 demands that the performer make the piano sound like an orchestra, transcending the instrument's limits to create a symphonic epic.
Composer Biography
Tchaikovsky composed his Grande Sonate Op. 37 while physically and nervously exhausted at age 38, having left his post at the Moscow Conservatory.
