Capriccio Italien, op. 45 ca. 16 mins. The fanfare opening this work may be misleading, and also the slow theme reminiscent of a funeral march that follows it. This slow beginning, though quite usual in Tchaikovsky’s works, does not reflect the work’s content. It is not one of the composer’s historic-patriotic works, such as Marche Slave or the 1812 Overture, which include military and tragic musical elements, but rather a much lighter piece. The unfolding colourful themes in Italian folk spirit tell its true story, a musical travel diary recounting Tchaikovsky’s impressions of his visit to Rome in January 1880. While waiting impatiently for news from Paris, where his Fourth Symphony was to be premiered, Tchaikovsky spent his time at the carnival in Rome. He roamed the festive streets, enchanted by the unique and colourful atmosphere. He was especially impressed by the merry outbursts of the Italians and pointed out in his letter to Nadejda von Meck: “No matter what shape the merriment of the crowd took, it was always natural and spontaneous”. However, a later letter to her makes it clear that his impressions were not only visual - his ears were wide open to the Italian folk tunes heard all over Rome. He wrote them down from memory, researched in archives for collections of Italian songs and dances, and within one week he completed the first sketch of this work. “I have already finished the sketches for an Italian fantasia on folk tunes. I think it has a bright future, it will be effective because of the wonderful tunes I happened to pick up”. This reveals another important detail: Tchaikovsky considered this piece a antasy, taking as a model the Spanish Fantasies by Glinka, whom he admired. Moreover, this suggests the composer’s liberation from committing to defined and strict forms. Although he had written a number of symphonies, he believed his writing was poor where form was concerned. He felt he was at his best writing music with no formal restrictions. Thus, after the exertion of composing the Fourth, in this piece he felt free of the form “burden”. Indeed, this makes the work complete contrast to a symphony: it is built as a sequence of musical themes, some of which recur freely. The orchestration, which Tchaikovsky completed a fewmonths later upon returning to Russia, is free and daring in a way, sometimes even with a tendency to imitate the original sound of Italian folk music. Only the last link in this chain of Italian themes, the Tarantella, was actually identified as a known Italian dance. All the other themes underwent some changes. As it turns out, the opening fanfare, that seemed alien to the spirit of the work, is also related to the Roman experience. Modest Tchaikovsky, the composer’s brother, said that it was a trumpet fanfare played daily at the military barracks near Tchaikovsky’s hotel. PYOTR ILYICH TCHAIKOVSKY (1840-1893)
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