Symphony No. 6 (Tchaikovsky)

Symphony No. 6
by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Portrait of Tchaikovsky, 1893
Other name	Pathétique Symphony
Key	B minor
Opus	74
Period	Romantic music
Composed	August 1893
Dedication	Tchaikovsky's nephew, Vladimir Davydov
Duration	about 45 minutes
Movements	Four
Scoring	Orchestra
Premiere
Date	28 October [O.S. 16 October] 1893
Location	Saint Petersburg
Conductor	Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

The Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Op. 74, also known as the Pathétique Symphony, is Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's final completed symphony, written between February and the end of August 1893. The composer entitled the work "The Passionate Symphony", employing a Russian word, Патетическая (Pateticheskaya), meaning "passionate" or "emotional", which was then translated into French as pathétique, meaning "solemn" or "emotive".

The composer led the first performance in Saint Petersburg on 28 October [O.S. 16 October] of that year, nine days before his death. The second performance, conducted by Eduard Nápravník, took place 21 days later, at a memorial concert on 18 November [O.S. 6 November].^[1][2] It included some minor corrections that Tchaikovsky had made after the premiere, and was thus the first performance of the work in the exact form in which it is known today. The first performance in Moscow was on 16 December [O.S. 4 December], conducted by Vasily Safonov.^[3] It was the last of Tchaikovsky's compositions premiered in his lifetime; his very last composition, the single-movement 3rd Piano Concerto, Op. 75, which was completed a short time before his death in October 1893, received a posthumous premiere.