P. I. Tchaikovsky, "Francesca da Rimini", symphonic poem

Francesca da Rimini, an Italian noblewoman who lived in the 13th century, was the daughter of Guido da Polenta, governor of Ravenna at the time. Long at odds with the Malatesta family of Rimini, Prince Guido wanted to secure a future peace by marrying Francesca to Giovanni Malatesta, the eldest son of his adversary, a brave but handicapped boy.
It was not a good idea. Giovanni had a brother, Paolo, a good-looking guy and healthy in both his legs... Yes, for Giovanni was lame.
Paolo was married, but as soon as Francesca arrived in Rimini he fell in love with her, and Francesca with him. They became lovers. When Giovanni, the lame, found out about the relationship, he murdered them both.
Francesca da Rimini was only twenty-five years old.

The crime caused an enormous commotion in the region. And the tragic story instantly and later inspired literary works, operas, and symphonic poems on a level unthinkable today. Dante Alighieri, a contemporary of Francesca and Paolo, immortalized the story in Canto V of The Divine Comedy: Francesca and Paolo are in Hell (as expected) although Dante's gaze is compassionate. Forbidden love and passion can also be the subject of art. The same thought Tchaikovsky who, curiously (or not so much), felt identified with the tragic affair of illicit love, six hundred years later.

A failed opera turns into a successful symphonic poem
The story intrigued Pyotr Tchaikovsky to no end, and when a friend, also a literary critic, proposed to him, in 1876, to compose an opera based on the fatal episode recreated by Dante, he immediately set to work. But the subsequent plans failed and the opera was never completed. His brother Modesto then suggested to Piotr the composition of a symphonic poem with the material sketched for the failed opera.

By that time, Antonina Milyukova had already written Tchaikovsky a good number of letters, but it was still a year before the master decided, clumsily, to marry her in order to silence the doubts about his sexual orientation. Tchaikovsky did not wish for Francesca's fate, and opted for "lawful" love, even if it was not part of his nature.

"Francesca da Rimini", symphonic poem, in E minor, op 32 (Fantasie d'aprés Dante)
Dedicated to a friend and former student, the work was composed in just three weeks in the summer of 1876, in Moscow, after the composer returned from a visit to Beirut to listen to Wagner's "musical dramas".
It premiered in Moscow in February of the following year, under the direction of Nicolas Rubinstein, in a concert scheduled by the Russian Musical Society.

Sections
Although the work is in a single movement lasting approximately 25 minutes, it is customary to distinguish in it an introduction and three sections, marked andante lugubre, allegro vivo, andante cantabile non troppo, and allegro vivo. As in any programmatic work, each of them is related to the story that is being "told", in this case, the lovers' torments in their afterlife, in Hell.

The Russian Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Russian conductor Mark Gorenstein.