Tchaikovsky
www.tchaikovsky-research.net

Midnight Review

Ночной парад

Song with piano accompaniment (?1862–64).

History

Interesting information is contained in the reminiscences of Tchaikovsky's colleague at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, Aleksandr Rubets. He wrote that Anton Rubinstein would "read a poem out loud and the students there and then had to come up with a musical setting for one or more voices, depending on their preference. They had to compose a draft, and the next day the work was to be submitted, already finished and written out... Among the suggested texts were Lermontov's Prayer, Dance of the Flowers, The Bells, and others... I remember once... Tchaikovsky had been given the task of writing music to Zhukovskii's Midnight Review... Tchaikovsky's piece turned out not to be a song, but rather a whole complex picture... The accompaniment to each verse was varied and intricate . Tchaikovsky had written the piece quickly in the course of two days" [1].

From: Музыкальное наследие Чайковского (1958), pp. 429–430
English text copyright © 2006 Brett Langston

Notes:

1. «Воспоминания проф. А. И. Рубца о первых годах Петербургской консерваторий», Новое время, 27 August 1912 [back]