The Seasons, Op. 37a: October (Autumn Song)
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Recording
Pavel Kolesnikov (piano)
- Album
- Tchaikovsky: The Seasons
- Year
- 2013
- Length
- Period
- Romantic
- Listen
Painting
George Inness
Autumn Oaks, ca. 1878
The piece
Tchaikovsky wrote The Seasons for the St. Petersburg journal Nouvellist, whose editor Nikolay Bernard printed one piece in each monthly issue of 1876. October, the Autumn Song in D minor, is marked Andante doloroso e molto cantabile and carries an epigraph Bernard chose from Aleksey Tolstoy: "Autumn, our poor garden is all falling down, the yellowed leaves are flying in the wind."
The recording
Pavel Kolesnikov recorded the complete cycle for Hyperion in the Concert Hall of the Wyastone Estate, Monmouth, in August 2013. Gramophone wrote that "Hyperion has captured all the bloom of his magical sonority."
Other recordings
Mikhail Pletnev's recording of the complete cycle for Virgin Classics is another to know.