The composer Mily Balakirev (1840-1893) came up with the idea of composing the Manfred Symphony by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. He suggested the subject, which he originally conceived for Berlioz, after his 1868 tour in Russia. But the now aged and ailing French artist was not disposed to compose.

Balakirev not only sent Tchaikovsky a detailed literary programme for the future work, but also instructions for the musical and pictorial development, even a tonal plan of the movements – confident that Pyotr Ilyich would write a masterpiece. However, he replies evasively. Two years later Balakirev repeatedly pursues him most persistently with his idea. During his stay in Switzerland, the composer reread Byron’s dramatic poem (it is the basis of the musical conception, and the plot is set in the same place in the Alps) and wrote to the commissioner: “I am not a great admirer of programme music. I feel infinitely free in the sphere of pure symphony.  I am taking up ‘Manfred’ reluctantly and to be frank only because I promised you.”  In a few months, from the end of April to 19 September 1885, he wrote the work. Having begun it with effort, he finished it with enthusiasm, but also endless fatigue.

It was premiered on 11 March 1886 in Moscow, conducted by Max Erdmansdörfer with the orchestra of the Russian Musical Society. “Half a success, but still an ovation,” Tchaikovsky noted in his diary. In a letter to Countess Nadezhda von Meck, he shared: ‘Among my close friends, some adore Manfred, others are displeased and say that I am not myself here. I think it is my best symphonic composition so far, but in its difficulty, impracticality and complexity it is doomed to failure – to disregard.” The composer’s words prove prophetic – compared to his last three symphonies, this opus by the Master is still very rarely performed today.

The exact title of the composition reads Manfred. Symphony (Poem) in 4 pictures after Byron’s dramatic poem, in B minor, Op. 58. Dedicated to M. A. Balakirev. Pyotr Ilyich composed his own programme to the work and did not use Balakirev’s ‘instructions’. In the music, he embodies, using the talents of a great symphonist, the drama of the hero – the godlessness and the incurable proud loneliness, the all-consuming sense of the meaninglessness of life, which carries tragic sorrow along with knowledge. The composer developed Balakirev’s concept of an idée fixe a la Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique (with the image of Manfred) with the leitmotif of the hero and its projections, transformations in the episodes of his life conveyed in the individual movements.

Here is Tchaikovsky’s literary scenario:

Part I – Manfred wanders in the Alps. Weary of the fatal question of existence, tormented by hopeless longings and the memory of past crimes, he suffers cruel spiritual pangs. He has plunged into occult sciences and commands the mighty powers of darkness, but neither they nor anything in this world can give him with the forgetfulness to which alone he vainly aspires. The memory of the lost Astarte, once passionately loved, gnaws his heart and there is neither limit nor end to Manfred’s despair.

Part II – The Alpine fairy appears before Manfred in the rainbow from the spray of a waterfall.

Part III – Pastoral. A picture of the bare, simple, free life of the mountain folk.

Part IV – The subterranean palace of Arimanes. Infernal orgy. Appearance of Manfred in the middle of the bacchanal. Evocation and appearance of the shade of Astarte. He is pardoned. Death of Manfred.