fbpx

KidsKonnect

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Facts & Worksheets

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was a Romantic Russian composer. He was the first Russian composer whose music had a lasting impact worldwide.

Search for Worksheets

Worksheets /People /Musicians /Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Facts & Worksheets

Premium
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Worksheets
Not ready to purchase a subscription? Click to download the free sample version   Download sample

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was a Romantic Russian composer. He was the first Russian composer whose music had a lasting impact worldwide, and made appearances as a guest conductor in Europe and the United States.

See the fact file below for more information on the Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky or alternatively, you can download our 20-page Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky worksheet pack to utilise within the classroom or home environment.

Key Facts & Information

BIOGRAPHY

  • Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, also spelled Chaikovsky, Chaikovskii, or Tschaikowsky, full name Anglicized as Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky, was born in Votkinsk, Russia on May 7, 1840.
  • His music has always appealed to the general public for its tuneful, open-hearted melodies, excellent harmonies, and vibrant, picturesque orchestration, all evoking a deep emotional response.
  • His First Symphony was well received in 1868. He then wrote Piano Concerto No.1 in B flat Minor in 1974.
  • In 1878, Tchaikovsky resigned from the Moscow Conservatory and spent the rest of his career writing much more prolifically. He died on November 6, 1893 in St. Petersburg.

EARLY YEARS

  • Tchaikovsky was the second of six living children of Kamsko-Votkinsk metal works president Ilya Tchaikovsky, and Alexandra Assier, a descendant of French emigrants.
  • From childhood, he showed a keen interest in music and his first musical memories came from a family home orchestrina.
  • He made his first recorded attempt at composition at the age of four, with a song written together with his younger sister Alexandra.
  • In 1845, he began taking piano lessons with a local teacher, whereby he became acquainted with the mazurkas of Frédéric Chopin and Friedrich Kalkbrenner’s piano parts. At that time, music education was not available in Russian schools, so Tchaikovsky’s parents did not think that their son could pursue a musical career. Instead, they decided to train the highly-strung and sensitive boy for a civil service career.
  • In 1850, Tchaikovsky entered the prestigious Imperial School of Jurisprudence, a boarding institution for young boys in St. Petersburg where he spent nine years.
  • He proved to be a diligent and successful student, popular among his peers. At the same time, Tchaikovsky developed close emotional relations with many of his schoolmates in this all-male environment.

YEAR OF FAME

  • Tchaikovsky left Russia at the very end of 1875, to move to Europe. He was deeply inspired by a performance by Georges Bizet’s Carmen at the Paris Opéra-Comique.
  • By comparison, he was left cold by the development of Richard Wagner’s Ring cycle, which he attended in Bayreuth, Germany in the summer of 1876.
  • He put the final touches to his symphonic fantasy Francesca da Rimini in November 1876, a work he felt especially pleased with. He completed the Swan Lake composition earlier that year, which was the first in his successful ballet trilogy. The ballet’s premiere took place on February 20, 1877, but due to poor staging and choreography, it was not a success, and soon was removed from the repertoire.
  • Tchaikovsky’s rising success in music both within and outside Russia eventually culminated in public interest in him and his personal life and sexual orientation. Though homosexuality was officially illegal in Russia, it was tolerated among the upper classes by the authorities.
  • But social and family stresses, as well as his dissatisfaction with the display of the same sexual impulses by his younger brother Modest, led to Tchaikovsky’s hasty decision in the summer of 1877 to marry Antonina Milyukova, a young and naive music student who had proclaimed her love for him.
  • Tchaikovsky’s homosexuality coupled with an almost total lack of intimacy between the pair, culminated in marital disaster. Within weeks, he fled abroad, never to live with his wife again.
  • On February 13, 1878, he wrote to his Florentine brother Anatoly: “It was only now, particularly after the tale of my marriage, that I finally began to realize that nothing is more fruitless than not wanting to be that which I am by nature.”

DEATH AND LEGACY

  • On November 6, 1893, Tchaikovsky died in St. Petersburg. While the cause of his death was officially announced as cholera, some of his biographers claim that after the embarrassment of a sex scandal trial, he committed suicide.
  • However, there is only spoken (no written) evidence in support of this theory.
  • Reviews have been profoundly unreasonable in their extreme pronouncements on the life and music of Tchaikovsky for much of the 20th century. Russian musicians have criticized his style as being insufficiently nationalistic. However, he became an official figure in the Soviet Union, in which no adverse criticism was tolerated; no in-depth studies of his personality were made on the same token.
  • Tchaikovsky’s most famous compositions include music for Swan Lake (1877), The Sleeping Beauty (1889), and The Nutcracker (1892). He is also renowned for the Overture of Romeo and Juliet (1870), and Symphony No. 6 in B Minor (Pathétique) (1893).

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Worksheets

This is a fantastic bundle which includes everything you need to know about the Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky across 20 in-depth pages. These are ready-to-use Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky worksheets that are perfect for teaching students about Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky who was a Romantic Russian composer. He was the first Russian composer whose music had a lasting impact worldwide, and made appearances as a guest conductor in Europe and the United States.

Complete List Of Included Worksheets

  • Tchaikovsky Facts
  • Tchaikovsky’s Roots
  • A Full Lifetime
  • Famous Compositions
  • According to Tchaikovsky
  • Homosexuality
  • Suicide Prevention
  • Jumbled Words
  • His Legacy
  • Brief Essay
  • Sex Scandal

Link/cite this page

If you reference any of the content on this page on your own website, please use the code below to cite this page as the original source.

Link will appear as Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Facts & Worksheets: https://kidskonnect.com - KidsKonnect, May 21, 2020

Use With Any Curriculum

These worksheets have been specifically designed for use with any international curriculum. You can use these worksheets as-is, or edit them using Google Slides to make them more specific to your own student ability levels and curriculum standards.

Related Resources