The Concert Overture, Part 1

Overview

During the course of the 19th century, program music was cultivated in various forms and took on increasing specificity, as seen, for example, in the third movement of Mahler’s Symphony no. 1. The 19th century revival of Shakespearean drama resonated with Romantic artists and inspired a great deal of program music, including Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet. In this lecture and the next, we discuss Tchaikovsky, his compositional style, and his Overture-Fantasy, Romeo and Juliet of 1869.