The Importance of the Themes in Tchaikovsky’s Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 35, Movement I
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by Alex Lipsky
chaikovsky wrote his Violin Concerto in D Major, Op. 35, in 1878 while at a Swiss resort recovering from depression due to his unhappy marriage. It was originally dedicated to Iosif Kotek, his lover, but Tchaikovsky changed his mind for fear of the gossip that would result. The first movement is in sonata form with two main themes, A and B. Both themes are crucial and important to the movement. One aspect of importance is that they are used frequently throughout the movement; every major section of the form starts with a statement or reference to a theme. In fact, 52% of the movement is thematic; the other 48% is transitional, introductory, and developmental. This heavy use of the themes makes them especially memorable by the end of the movement. For a concerto movement to be 52% thematic is highly unusual. Most concertos exhibit a substantially larger percentage of transitional and developmental material with much less time spent on themes. (It should be understood that “theme” and “thematic” refer here to relatively selfsufficient passages that contain large amounts of thematic material and not to passages that contain thematic motives or smaller amounts of thematic material.) By comparison, the first movements of two other important violin concertos, Beethoven’s Concerto in D Major, Op. 61, and Mozart’s Concerto No. 3 are only 6% and 17% thematic, respectively. Another important aspect of the themes is how they unify the piece through their step-wise, middle ground motion. The sonata form of the movement is almost textbook, with a clear exposition, development, and recapitulation.The exposition is 127 measures long; the development is 83 measures long; the recapitulation is 90
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