Tchaikovsky: Six Romances, Op. 38 (1878) I. Don Juan's Serenade. Allegro non tanto (B minor)
Tchaikovsky: Six Romances, Op. 38
(1878)
I. Don Juan's Serenade (Серенада Дон-Жуана)
Allegro non tanto (B minor)
Tchaikovsky's Six Romances (Шесть романсов), Op. 38 (TH 101 ; ČW 246-251), were written between February and July 1878, after the composer completed his work on the Symphony No. 4 and Yevgeny Onegin.
Instrumentation
Scored for high voice (Nos. 2, 3), medium voice (Nos. 4, 5, 6) or baritone (No. 1), with piano accompaniment.
Movements:
I. Don Juan's Serenade (Серенада Дон-Жуана) Allegro non tanto (B minor)
The distant Alpujara go out
Golden edge,
To the call of the guitar
Come out, my dear!
Anyone who says that the other
Here is equal to you
Everyone, burning with love,
I call everyone, everyone, and everyone to a mortal battle!
From moonlight
Zardel sky,
Oh come out Niseta
Oh come out Niseta
Hurry to the balcony!
From Seville to Grenada
In the quiet dusk of the night
Serenading
The sound of swords is heard.
Lots of blood, lots of songs
For lovely ladies pour, -
I'm the one who is prettier than all
Everything, everything, I will give my song and blood!
From moonlight
Zardel sky,
Oh come out Niseta
Oh come out Niseta
Hurry to the balcony!
Aleksey Tolstoy (1817–1875), from his dramatic poem Don Juan (Дон-Жуан) (1859–60).
Composition:
In February 1878, Tchaikovsky expressed his desire to compose "a variety of small pieces". "This will be something between relaxation and work". He then asked Nikolay Kashkin (through Pyotr Jurgenson) and Nadezhda von Meck to suggest appropriate texts for the romances. On 27 February/11 March, in response to his request, the latter sent the composer works by Afanasy Fet, Aleksey Tolstoy, Lev Mey, and Fyodor Tyutchev. Tchaikovsky thanked Nadezhda von Meck in a letter of 7/19 March from Clarens: "I am particularly pleased with the Tolstoy, which I like very much... In particular I am interested in Don Juan, which I read a very long time ago. I was enchanted by the section you indicated in Don Juan, and certainly I shall set it to music".
The first romance was written at Florence on 11/23 February 1878, "between lunch and dinner". This was The Love of a Dead Man (No. 5)—the only one of Tchaikovsky's romances set to words by Mikhail Lermontov. He told Nadezhda von Meck: "I wrote it because in one of your letters you mentioned to me your view of his poetry set to music. This was in February at Florence".
The second romance to be written, it seems shortly after the first, was Pimpinella. Tchaikovsky heard this song in Florence performed by a street-singer named Vittorio: "The day before leaving I listened to him once more and noted down the words and music to one song, which I am sending you with my accompaniment. Isn't it a delightful tune? And such peculiar words!". In another letter to Nadezhda von Meck, Tchaikovsky wrote that "amongst my six romances, the melody of one of them is very similar from the one I sent you last year in letter from Switzerland, just slightly altered by me and adapted to the form of a vocal number suitable for a salon concert". On 15/27 March, Tchaikovsky told Pyotr Jurgenson: "I've already done seven small pieces, two romances and the opening of a piano sonata".
The composer finished the romances in Russia, while staying at Kamenka from 11/23 April to 12/24 May 1878, at Brailov from 17/29 May to 30 May/11 June, at Kamenka from 13/25 June to 26 June/8 July, and at Verbovka from 4/16 July to 5/17 August 1878.
Publication:
The Six Romances were published for the first time by Pyotr Jurgenson, appearing in November 1878. In 1940 they were included in volume 44 of Tchaikovsky's Complete Collected Works, edited by Ivan Shishov and Nikolay Shemanin.
Autographs:
Tchaikovsky's manuscript scores of all six romances are now preserved in the Russian National Museum of Music in Moscow (ф. 88, No. 138).
Dedication:
All the romances are dedicated to the composer's brother Anatoly Tchaikovsky.