The Symphony No.6 ("Pathetique") was Tchaikovsky's "swan song" in which the composer possibly foretelled his alleged suicide.
The sonata form in the first movement is of some interest. After the exposition of the two themes (the first sombre while the second nostalgically lyrical) follows the development section with an exhaustive elaboration of the first theme but a total absence of the second. The second theme is heard again at the end of the first movement, though not as a standard recapitulation but as a coda.
In the second movement it is worth noticing an intermediate episode whose mood foreshadows the dark atmosphere of the finale of the symphony and gives a sense of cyclic form to the overall work.
Tugan Sokhiev, conductor
