Tchaikovsky
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Nadezhda Rimskaia-Korsakova

Nadezhda Nikolaevna Rimskaia-Korsakova (Надежда Николаевна Римская-Корсакова) was a Russian pianist, composer, and writer, born Nadezhda Purgol'd [Рургольд] on on 19/31 October 1848 in Saint Petersburg.

Nadezhda began to play the piano at the age of nine, and in the mid-1860s she studied at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory under Anton Gerke for piano, Nikolai Zaremba for music theory, and later Nikolai Rimskii-Korsakov for composition and orchestration. The latter became her husband in 1872, after which she concentrated less on composition, and more on arrangements and proof-reading.

In 1871 her transcription of Tchaikovsky's overture-fantasia Romeo and Juliet for piano duet was published by Bote and Bock in Berlin, although ill health prevented her from providing a similar service for his Symphony No. 2, which in 1872 she had apparently begged Tchaikovsky 'with tears in her eyes' to arrange for piano duet.

Tchaikovsky dedicated his Cradle Song (No. 1 of the Six Romances, Op. 16) to Nadezhda Rimskaia-Korsakova in 1873, apparently in anticipation of the birth of her first child (Mikhail) later that year.

Nadezhda Rimskaia-Korsakova died on 11/24 May 1919 in Saint Petersburg, aged 70.