‘Italy, Florence – nothing gives me the slightest pleasure so far’ Tchaikovsky wrote to his brother. ‘I cannot live outside Russia’ In the depth of depression, the composer completed his 10th opera, The Queen of Spades, and commenced work on his sextet Souvenir de Florence, and completed it upon his return to Russia in June 1890. Melancholy Russian folk melodies mingle with Tchaikovsky’s Florentine theme rising in the Adagio. Maybe he did have an affection for the city after all? 1892, and more creative struggles – a symphony in E flat was abandoned (much of it becoming the 3rd piano concerto and the Andante & Finale), and a new symphony in B minor started. If the melancholy of Souvenir de Florence is never far from the surface, it threatens to overwhelm the 6th symphony. ‘I am very proud of the symphony, and I think it’s the best of my compositions’. Tchaikovsky died 9 days after conducting the first performance, a victim of the cholera pandemic raging over the Russian Empire