RUSLANIA: Tchaikovsky Petr. Cantata to the Polytechnic Exhibition in Moscow 1872. For Mixed Chorus and Orchestra. Vocal Score

The Cantata is published for the first time in its author's version, with original text by Ya. Polonsky. For concert and educational practice.

Editor's Preface

In 1872, in connection with the 200th anniversary of Peter the Great's birth, Polytechnical Exhibition opened in Moscow. Tchaikovsky was commissioned to write a cantata to words by Yakov Polonsky for its inauguration. The work's premiere took place on May 31,1872.
During Tchaikovsky's lifetime, the cantata remained unpublished. The score's autograph, held in the library of the office of Imperial Theatres, was lost. In 1896-98 it was restored after the orchestral parts by A. K. Farsky, the librarian of the Bolshoy Theatre. In 1902 the conductor Yu. N. Pomerantsev arranged a piano score based on this version. In Tchaikovsky's Complete Works both the full score and the piano score of the work, published under the title 'Cantata in Honour of the 200th Anniversary of the Birth of Peter the Great', were seriously revised. The orchestral episode, which included the theme of the hymn of Tsarist Russia, was withdrawn and placed in the Supplement; the text by Polonsky underwent considerable changes in order to comply with political conjuncture.
The present edition is based on Pomerantsev's autograph. The musical text was collated with Farsky's score, as well as with the manuscript copies of orchestral parts retained at the Tchaikovsky House Museum at Klin. The text by Polonsky was corrected after Modest Tchaikovsky's book The Life of Petr Il'ich Tchaikovsky.