On one occasion Derzhanovsky's circle was visited by an artist (his name has been lost) who had lived for some time in France and Italy. He told many stories of the life of the people in these countries, and in France particularly. He had often heard the workers and artisans of the Paris suburbs singing their favorite songs in the open air after their day' s work, and gave the company a spirited rendering of the melody of the Carmagnole. "This man made a deep impression on me," says Myaskovsky, "and I made up my mind to write a symphony expressing in some way the feelings that he had roused in me. The original and highly dynamic construction of the Carmagnole as sung by the artist greatly appealed to me and was quite unlike anything I had ever found in the usual editions (including all the most authoritative versions). Later, in the process of composition, I got the idea of including another song in the style of the Carmagnole. This was the Ça Ira, which I likewise treated in an entirely new way in my exposition and harmonization of the melody.
"I worked on the Sixth Symphony for a whole year. In the interval between the initial impulse (when I made the first sketch of the song) and the final realization of the plan an important part in the process of crystallzation was played by a reading of Verhaeren' s Les Aubes, which I also included in the framework of the symphony. Les Aubes became what might be called the pre-idea of the work: the death of a revolutionary hero and the solemn honors paid to him by the people in farewell. The symphony was completed only in 1923."
The theory that the Sixth Symphony is associated with the memory of two of the composer' s friends who are supposed to have perished in the Revolution is a fallacy. The only fact which could have had any such bearing on his work was the death of his aunt, Yelikonida Konstantinovna Myaskovskaya, in the winter of 1920. This had some significance of a purely biographical character. The flat where Yelikonida Konstantinovna had lived was bleak, cheerless and very cold. The wind whistled and howled in the chimneys. All this left its mark on Myaskovsky when he returned to Petrograd - particularly the howling of the wind. "I wanted to include this impression in the scherzo. Of course, it had no bearing on the musical content of the symphony, except as a purely external impulse."
The Sixth Symphony is written in four movements. The first is a broadly developed allegro in sonata form, full of musical variety. A short, highly characteristic introduction of three imperative and exclamatory chords twice repeated tutti, fortissimo is followed by the sharply rhythmic, mobile and resilient theme of the opening subject. Then follows a troubled, somewhat sinister episode like a message of illboding in tempo accelerando. This passage is later supplemented by a new theme in the form of a fanfare. Gradually the general tension subsides and gives place to a second phase of moods: a contemplative solemn chorale, a few bars of flowing, languorous music, and finally the theme, woven of soft, sighing intonations suggestive of a subdued complaint, which brings the exposition to a close.
It might be said that throughout the first movement, no less than in the exposition, there are two kinds of musical ideas - those expressive of insistence, impetuosity and mobility and, in contrast to these, lyrical passages of vague, tender nature, the sublime, ethereal emotions of a mind immersed in elegiac dreams. This second group of ideas symbolizes the world of a man who has become detached from his real environment. At the end of the first movement the effect of these moods is almost cataleptic in its intensity. The gloomy tremolando of the strings, the measured and dull booming of the bass drum in triplets, the descending progression of chords over a long-sustained tonic pedal point are all conducive to this effect.
In the second movement (Presto tenebroso) the composer evidently set out to create an atmosphere of mystery and darkness and in this he is entirely successful. Although each of its themes is entirely distinctive, they all bear the common imprint of gloom as of some physical presence, a sense of "creepiness" such as might be evoked by the sound of a moaning wind or a blizzard out-of-doors. The whirling effect created by the different devices employed in the opening theme and the theme of the first subject, ranging from the lowest registers of the orchestra to the highest, the tonality, which is one of the most somber of the minor keys (F minor), the use of the augmented scale, the tenseness of tone of the melodic material due to the chromatic construction of the themes, the steady thud of the bass in the second theme, and finally the listless and melancholy murmur of the muted but sonorous strings with the celesta in the middle episode (musically akin to the lamentation of the maniac in Moussorgsky' s Boris Godounov) - these are a few of the devices with which the composer conveys his ideas.
The third movement (Andante) belongs essentially to the same sphere of musical ideas as the first movement, although with a difference which springs from a certain modification of the images expressing weariness, tenderness and, as it were, a renunciation of all excitement, unrest and "materiality." Occasionally there are threatening chords, like malignant flashes against this dark background, which recall vividly to mind the introduction to the symphony. These, however, are exceptions and do no more than interrupt for a brief period the prevailing mood of the movement.
The finale is a grand apotheosis of all that has gone before. At the same time the composer broaches new problems of expression and attains original solutions. The stormy, revolutionary Carmagnole, the categorical emphasis of the Ça Ira, the Dies Irae and a Russian folk song dealing with the parting of soul and body - such are the leitmotifs of the finale. The composer superbly lays bare the essence of the Ça Ira, and Carmagnole as songs of the people and symbols of Revolution. From these he achieves a natural and sincere transition to the lament for the dead hero - the Dies Irae as a symbol of death and the aptly chosen theme of the Russian folk song. The idea of life and death is closely interwoven with the whole fabric of the symphony.
It is only in the finale that the conflicting elements which are outlined in the first movement of the symphony, and are developed at length in the second and third movements, are finally placed and solved. The idea of life is interwoven with the idea of Revolution; the idea of death is interwoven with the inevitable sacrifices of the Revolution and the inevitable grief of bereavement. In this work Myaskovsky records in terms of symphonic music the attitude to the Revolution of a large section of the Russian intelligentsia, by whom it was fervently accepted but not as yet fully understood.
The artistic power of the Sixth Symphony, the depth of its ideas, secure for it a special place in Russian music. For force of generalization it can be compared only with the last symphony of Tchaikovsky. In this connection it should be pointed out that the Sixth Symphony was no chance offshoot of the composer's career. Its nearest prototype is perhaps the Third Symphony; but its deep roots go back to Alastor, and certain passages from The Vow of Silence in the sphere of symphonic music, and to the Second Sonata in F sharp minor in Myaskovsky's works for the pianoforte. There is a world of difference between the Third and Sixth Symphonies, despite their kinship in color and movement. The essence of the Third Symphony lies in its expression of vague and troubled aspirations, culminating in tragedy, whereas the power of the Sixth Symphony lies in its reflection of a real struggle above personalities - its reflection of the Revolution in the creative consciousness of the composer.
From: “Myaskowsky – His Life and Work” by Alexandrei Ikonnikov