Tchaikovsky : Autumn Song (October) from "The Seasons"

An autumnal afternoon in October 2007, at the house of my close friend's mother-in-law, I played several piano pieces and among them, there was P.Tchaikovsky's famous piano piece, "Autumn Song". The video was recorded by one of the guests there.

"Chant d' Automne" (in English: Autumn Song) is a character piece for the piano solo, that P.Tchaikovsky composed among 11 other pieces in an album set originally entitled "Les Saisons" (Fr.) , or "The Seasons". (Eng.)

The 12 pieces and their titles are:

1.January : At the Fireside
2.February : Carnival
3.March : Song of the Lark
4.April : Snowdrop
5.May : Starlight Nights
6.June : Barcarolle
7.July : Song of the Reaper
8.August : Harvest
9.September : The Hunt
10.October : Autumn Song
11.November : Troika
12.December : Christmas

The "Autumn Song" is the 10th piece, a very gloomy reflex of "Autumn", on Tchaikovsky's romantic, melancholic, tender mood.

My personal perspectives about "Autumn Song" :

The song begins with the gloomy manner of the yellow leaves of trees, falling down to the earth, in Autumn... Tchaikovsky expresses his saddest and his most pessimistic feelings in this song... In fact, to be melancholic and pessimistic was his nature. In his 6th Symphony (Pathetique) , Tchaikovsky believes that the man's "destiny" wins his "determinaion" (however L.V.Beethoven believed on the contrary of this, in his 5th Symphony)

In Literature of most cultures, "Autumn" is a symbol of agedness, elderliness, and hopelessness...Tchaikovsky's Autumn is actually a very mournful "Elegy". It is composed in D minor, i.e. as the most mournful tonality key in classical music. ("Requiems are mosly being composed in D mionor)

In the 2nd theme, the composer regrets that his youth is gone with the wind...

In the 3rd theme that leads to the highest point of the piece, at first, Tcahikovsky makes a flashback to a short, sweet dream; expressing the sweet memories of his youth... the love memories... and very soon after, he wakes up; finding out that it was just a dream, and then he shouts as a very bitter sigh hopelessly... alas!

The song is being continued with reprising the 1st & 2nd themes, and the Coda is at the point of death and dimness... By the musical expression "Morendo" ( (that is indicated in the notation by Tchaikovsky himself) , the piece leads to the last breath... and finally -- Death...

"Autumn Song" is currently in Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music's 2007-2008 syllabus as an exam piece for Grade 7.
.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• Autumn
• Fall
• October
• Song
• Tchaikovsky
• Tchaikowsky
• Seasons
• Romanic
• Piano
• Gloomy
• Hamedantchi

[armeniaca85]

Tchaikovski's music tells so many different stories, one should just be able to find his own story among them!

[lillith886]

how lovely!:-) autumn for me is a lovely time of the year, all the trees so beautiful and then their leaves fall and mulch down to nuture the seeds they dropped. this is a beautiful piece of music and you truly did it justice. thankyou for sharing it with us out here in cyber space.

[Totomisea]

I love the song, and it's probably the camera quality's fault, but it sounds just a tad too choppy-ish to me. You're playing smooth, smooth, smooth, smooth and then an accent that makes me jump.

[WincProductions]

Im not hating but I personally think that you played a bit to slow, you played kinda loud and this is supposed to be a soft calming song like autumn, not really loud. and try to add emotion, for some people its not easy but these are some suggestion to help you improve in this piece! =)

[xfreshtildeath]

One of my favorite songs ever. Well played.

[vashti4ever]

very real and warm! great job!

[rafaelmercedez]

Great performances!!