Held in the Republic Hall of the Mediterranean Conference Centre, an all-Tchaikovsky concert featured the Malta Phil- harmonic Orchestra in splendidly full strength, under the ever dynamic direction of Brian Schembri. The concert was very well-attended, but how one wished that some people were not to applaud between movements. This tends to spoil the magic and continuous flow of the music.

For magic there indeed was, because the best of Tchaikovsky is always enchanting, beautiful, melodious and well-crafted. A bit self-indulgent, some would say, but the man did not fear to express in his music the havoc wrought by the demons which gnawed at him, and which his actions could not.

Two of Tchaikovsky’s most popular works were on the programme, his only Violin Concerto and the Pathétique Symphony, his last very tragic and most famous music in that form.

The violinist scheduled to perform the concerto, and who for whatever reason could not travel to Malta, was substituted by the very accomplished and brilliant Russian violinist Natalya Lomeiko. She stepped in with a performance that was a true mix of dazzling bravura and tenderness, the latter aspect especially evident in the middle movement marked Canzonetta: andante.

The work dazzled and puzzled early audiences and provoked widely divergent reactions. One was that it was a concerto for violin against, rather than with, orchestra. Lomeiko deeply impressed with her performance.

That Tchaikovsky wrote almost anything in a symphonic frame of mind is also held by some. The orchestra is not a mere accompanying body in the concerto and has meaty and intricate passages of considerable difficulty, which are the kind of challenge which provoke into energetic action the likes of Schembri.

The maestro, in fact, built up tremendous climaxes which carry all before them and which easily seduce some into being unable to resist bursting into (misplaced) applause. It does not mean that the silent ones do not appreciate the wide contrasts between movement and the gradual build-up which leads to this, and they did show it more than clearly when the ‘battle’ was over.

A true mix of dazzling bravura and tenderness

We are used to the odd form of the B minor Symphony N.6, an amazing work that – contrary to form – ends with a slow movement.

This, too, had puzzled first-time listeners. The symphony could be seen as a life testament of the highly-strung composer who, quite frankly, wears his heart on his sleeve here. He seems to have had enough: he could have had some kind of premonition that death was waiting round the corner.

Debate still rages as to details how and why the composer died days after the premiere of this work. It is dark and tragic in its beauty and gloom. An anguished cry rises in the opening movement, setting the pace leading to the final desperate surrender. This was projected very well in the opening Adagio – allegro non troppo.

If the wallowing in despair of an afflicted human being at times tended to be just that slightly longer, here (and again in the finale) this served all the better to highlight the contrasting reaction in the waltz-like Allegro con grazia.

This brave attempt to stand up to fate and react was doomed to get caught in the subsequent energetic often frenetic, relentless whirlwind sweep of the Allegro molto vivace. It was, at times, an almost painfully aggressive march, rushing forward but always under firm control. Still, it was needed to serve its purpose, and so it did.

The end was inevitable in the Adagio lamentoso. A final anguished, and defeated, cry and the music faded into a bleak nothingness, sad but very beautifully wrought.