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Repertoire Pyotr Tchaikovsky 1878 Op. 39 No. 16

Old French Song

From the Children's Album, Op. 39 No. 16

Easy Full

Two steps

First the easy arrangement, then the full version: the same notes, with more voices and detail.

Easy version Lesson 04 Old French Song Full version Lesson 09 Old French Song: the full version

The scores

Both versions in full: listen to them before you open the lesson.

The story of the piece

Pyotr Tchaikovsky composed the Children's Album, Op. 39, in 1878. He sketched all 24 pieces in the spring at Kamenka and made the fair copy in the summer at Verbovka. The album is dedicated to the composer's favourite nephew, Volodya Davydov. Its subtitle reads "à la Schumann", in Schumann's manner: Tchaikovsky wrote to Nadezhda von Meck that he wanted to make a series of little pieces for children with attractive titles, like Schumann's. He meant the very Album for the Young that gives this course its "Melody". Jurgenson published the album in Moscow the same year.

"Old French Song" is the sixteenth piece of the album, in G minor. Tchaikovsky used its theme a second time, in the opera The Maid of Orleans, which he began in December of the same year: in Act II the melody is sung by a chorus of minstrels.

Where the tune itself came from is disputed. Descriptions of the opera call it the French song "Mes belles amourettes", but the sources do not say where Tchaikovsky found it or how old it really is. It may be a genuine French tune, or Tchaikovsky may have written the "old" song himself. There is no reliable answer.

In lesson 04 you play the easy version: the melody in the right hand and one bass note at a time in the left. In lesson 09 you play the whole piece with all its voices, as in the Schirmer edition of 1904.