Klarinet Archive - Posting 000285.txt from 1998/10

From: Rachel Ann Gorden Mercer <rgorden@-----.edu>
Subj: Re: [kl] TCHAIKOVSKY AND SKELETONS
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 1998 10:22:46 -0400

If you're interested in the story of Tschaikovsy's death, I'm reading as
very interesting book on the subject. It's called Tchaikovsky's Last Days
by Poznansky. He has done a lot of research in Russia and looked at
diaries and the writings of his brother, Modest. He examines both the
suicide theory and the cholera theory. It's interesting.

Happy reading,
Rachel Gorden Mercer
rgorden@-----.edu

nny!1On Mon, 5 Oct 1998, avrahm galper wrote:

> TSCHAIKOVSY AND SKELETONS
>
> Talking about skeletons, I picked up a book at the library, a book of
> anecdotes about the musical world.
> There was a story about Tschaikovsky. We now know that he was gay.
> But in those days it was not that well known.
>
> Apparently he was having some profound influence on a son of the Grand
> Duke (related to the Czar) and the Grand Duke was not happy about it.
>
> Tschaikovsky's former law student friends called him (he studied law
> when he was young) and had a confrontation with him.
>
> The law at the time was: a person discovered to be gay was deprived of
> his citizenship and exiled to Siberia.
>
> They gave him an alternative: commit suicide to avoid this fate.
>
> This is why there is the story of Tschaikovsky drinking unboiled water
> in a restaurant during an epidemic and dying of cholera.
>
> At his funeral, the big named composers looked at the open casket and
> Rimsky-Korsakov was heard saying, "Don't they keep these coffins
> hermetically closed when one dies of cholera?"
>
> The story shook me. I asked a Russian musician living in Toronto about
> it and he said that it was true. Tschaikovsky drank poisin to avoid the
> penalty.
>
> When one listens to the last movement of the pathetique, one can hear
> the depth of grief he must have been subjected to. He may have written
> this before this event.
> Still one of my favorite composers.
>
>
> Avrahm Galper
> THE UPBEAT BAERMANN MELODIC SCALES AND ARPEGGIOS
> http://www.sneezy.org/avrahm_galper/index.html
>
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>
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