What is Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky?
[[File:Porträt des Komponisten Pjotr I. Tschaikowski (1840-1893).jpg|thumb|250px|''Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky'' by Nikolay Kuznetsov, 1893]] [[File:Tchaikovsky Signature.svg|right|250px]] '''Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky''' ({{lang-ru|Пётр Ильич Чайковский}} {{Audio|Ru-Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.ogg|listen}}, pronounced chai-KOV-skee; 7 May 1840 – 6 November 1893) was a [[Russia]]n [[composer]] who lived in the [[Romantic music|Romantic period]]. He is one of the most popular of all Russian composers. He wrote melodies which were usually dramatic and emotional. He learned a lot from studying the music of Western Europe, but his music also sounds very Russian. His [[Composition (music)|compositions]] include 11 [[opera]]s, 3 [[ballet]]s, [[orchestra|orchestral music]], [[chamber music]] and over 100 [[song]]s. His famous ballets (''[[Swan Lake]]'', ''[[The Nutcracker]] '' and ''[[Sleeping Beauty]]'') have some of the best known tunes in all of [[romantic music]]. He is widely regarded as the greatest composer of ballets. == Early years == Tchaikovsky’s father worked as a [[mining]] [[engineer]]. His mother’s grandfather was a [[French people|Frenchman]] who had moved to Russia. She was a nervous woman and Tchaikovsky may have got his nervous character from her. Tchaikovsky was only five when he started taking [[piano]] lessons. He was soon better than his teacher. The family had an [[orchestrion]] (a kind of musical box) which played some tunes from classical music by [[Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart|Mozart]], [[Vincenzo Bellini|Bellini]], [[Donizetti]] and [[Rossini]]. In 1848 the family moved to St. Petersburg. Tchaikovsky was unhappy and unsettled as he was often separated from his family who moved several times. In 1854 his mother died. He tried to comfort himself by playing music. He spent nine years at the School of Jurisprudence. When he left school, he had to get a job. For four years he worked as a [[company clerk|clerk]] in the [[Ministry of Justice]]. Then the composer and pianist [[Anton Rubinstein]] helped him to