The Great Composers in Words and Music series consists of mini-biographies read by acclaimed actors and illustrated with musical excerpts. The biographies are full of fascinating detail and anecdote, and have been written in a highly approachable style by Davinia Caddy.

Is there any music more instantly recognisable and beautifully scored than Tchaikovsky’s wildly popular ballet Swan Lake? These and other works have become enduring classics, yet they were not uncontroversial in Tchaikovsky’s day, and there are those that still wonder if his style is fundamentally European or ardently Russian. Find out more about Tchaikovsky’s childhood obsession with music, his turbulent relationships with friends and colleagues, and how he overcame the deepest of personal crises to transcend all with a creative ambition that has left us with some of the greatest music ever written. The narrative is illustrated with musical excerpts from Piano Concerto no.1, Symphonies nos. 4 and 6, the 1812 Overture, The Nutcracker, Swan Lake and The Sleeping Beauty, among others.

Davinia Caddy studied music at the University of Cambridge, where she graduated with a BA (Hons), MPhil and, in 2005, a PhD. Her doctoral dissertation was broadly based on French musical culture from 1890 to 1914. She has since taught at the Universities of Oxford, Oxford Brookes and Auckland. Her books include The Ballets Russes and Beyond: Music and Dance in Belle-Époque Paris (Cambridge University Press, 2012), Musicology and Dance: Historical and Critical Perspectives (Cambridge University Press, 2020, coedited with Maribeth Clark), and How to Hear Classical Music, a contemporary guide to the Western classical repertoire written for the general public (Awa Press, 2013).

Lucy Scott trained at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. Her stage credits include Emma (Tricycle Theatre), Search and Destroy (New End Theatre) and Mansfield Park (Chichester Festival). Her television credits include Pride and Prejudice (BBC), Rosemary and Thyme (ITV) and Spooks (BBC). She also appeared in the film Tom Brown’s Schooldays with Stephen Fry. She has read many titles for Naxos AudioBooks, including Balzac’s Cousin Bette, Eliot’s Romola, Fontane’s Effi Briest and Richardson’s Clarissa.