A voice that sings of love & sorrow
12 October 2026, 3:00pm - 5:00pm
Tchaikovsky’s personal life was infamously turbulent, but what do we truly know about his inner emotional world? How, despite legal prohibitions when it came to male homosexuality in Imperial Russia, did he navigate his private life? In this lecture recital, Philip Ross Bullock – author of a 2016 biography of Tchaikovsky – argues that the composer’s songs represent an intimate diary of his innermost thoughts and feelings.
Programme
- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840 - 1893)
- Ne ver' moj drug, 'Do not believe it, my friend' (1869) Op. 6 no.1
- I bol’no, i sladko 'Its so painful, it's so sweet' Op. 6 no.3
- Zabyt' tak skoro, 'To forget so soon'
- On tak menya lyubil 'He Loved Me So' Op. 28 No. 4
- Strashnaya minuta 'Fearful minute' Op. 28 no.6
- Letter scene from Evgeny Onegin
- To bylo ranneju vesnoj 'It was early spring' (1878) Op. 38 no.2
- Sred shumnovo bala 'Amid the din of the ball' (1878) Op. 38 no.3 from 6 Romances
- Pimpenella Op. 38 no.6
- Ja li v pole da ne travushka 'Was I not a blade of grass in the field?' (1880) Op. 47 no.7
- Nochi bezumye 'Frenzied nights' Op. 60 no.6
- Uzh gasli v komnatakh ogni 'Inside the lights were already growing dim' Op. 63 no.5
- Serenda 'Serenade' Op. 63 no.6
- V etu lunnuyu noch 'On this moonlit night' Op. 73 no.3
- Snova, kak prezhde 'Again, as before, alone' (1893) Op. 73 no.6
