Tchaikovsky's Empire: A New Life of Russia's Greatest Composer [Hardcover]

A thrilling new biography of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovskycomposer of some of the worlds most popular orchestral and theatrical music

A lively, argumentative and thoughtful reflection on one of the 19th centurys most important musical figures.Michael ODonnell,Wall Street Journal

Tchaikovsky is famous for all the wrong reasons. Portrayed as a hopeless romantic, a suffering melancholic, or a morbid obsessive, the Tchaikovsky we think we know is a shadow of the fascinating reality. It is all too easy to forget that he composed an empires worth of music, and navigated the imperial Russian court to great advantage.

In this iconoclastic biography, celebrated author Simon Morrison re-creates Tchaikovskys complex world. His life and art were framed by Russian national ambition, and his work was the emanation of an imperial subject: kaleidoscopic, capacious, cosmopolitan, decentred.

Morrison reexamines the relationship between Tchaikovskys music, personal life, and politics; his support of Tsars Alexander II and III; and his engagement with the cultures of the imperial margins, in Ukraine, Poland, and the Caucasus.Tchaikovskys Empireunsettles everything we thought we knewand gives us a vivid new appreciation of Russias most popular composer.

“A lively, argumentative and thoughtful reflection on one of the 19th century’s most important musical figures.”—Michael O’Donnell,Wall Street Journal

“[A] well grounded and lucid new account.”—Richard Morrison,Times(UK)

“Concise. . . . A fresh profile of a familiar composer.”—Financial Times, “Best Books of 2024: Classical and Pop Music”

“It is lucid, original and, above all, highly enjoyable.”—Stephen Walsh,Literary Review

“Morrison slashes the overgrowth of fantasy, rumor, and plain bad scholl“¨