Wagner: Vorspiel und Liebestod & Tchaikovsky: Symphony in F Minor No. 4, Op. 36

Featuring

Dmitry Liss
Philharmonie Zuidnederland
Richard Wagner
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

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Composition History

Wagner began work on Tristan und Isolde in 1857, interrupting his immense tetralogy Der Ring des Nibelungen, and described some of his Wesendoncklieder as studies for it.

Critical Reception

Tchaikovsky's Fourth Symphony was initially misunderstood by critics, with The New York Post calling it 'semi-barbaric' and others describing it as 'enormous noise'.

Composer's Artistic Vision

Richard Wagner considered himself the savior of German Romantic music, aiming to elevate opera to a higher level.

Compositional Technique

In the Prelude to Tristan und Isolde, Wagner pushed classical tonality to its limits, creating a highly chromatic musical language with the 'Tristan chord' which lacks tonal direction.

Composer Biography

Tchaikovsky's Fourth Symphony was composed during a difficult period in his life, following his disastrous marriage to Antonina Miliukova and a suicide attempt.

Composer Biography

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, a tormented Russian Romantic composer, was considered too focused on Italian music to be truly Russian, yet too Russian to sound truly European.