Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky remains to this day one of the most-performed Russian composers. Based on recent studies and source editions, this book demonstrates the close interrelationship between Tchaikovsky's life and his work. The author portrays the versatility of the musician who died at the mere age of 53 under controversial circumstances in St. Petersburg. About the German edition of this book: "[...] Constantin Floros devotes himself initially to the biography and then to the compositional oeuvre, divided according to genre and supplemented by concrete illustrations, thus giving greater significance to the music." (Forum Musikbibliothek 27, 2006) "[...] the music gets more weight of its own in the more detailed analyses - illustrated with revealing note citations - which yet always remain readily accessible." (Steffen A. Schmidt, Das Orchester 02/2007)

The present autobiography sets out from the contrast between "establishment" and "outsiders" in science and scholarship. It portrays a number of prominent composers, conductors and musicologists and seeks to illuminate the nature of the phenomenon of music from diverse vantage points, centering on cultural, biographic, psychological, philosophic, critical, aesthetic and axiological questions. Lutz Lesle (Das Orchester, 2018): At the price of being deemed an outsider, Floros has devoted a major part of his life's work to the semantic dimension of music, from the Viennese Classics to Postmodernism. His endeavor has been to preserve for music the dignity of manifold meaning that the school of bean counters were stripping from it by reducing musical scores to structure-analytical databases. "To simply ignore the spiritual depth dimension of important musical art works," the author bluntly proclaims, "and to limit oneself to the investigation of the 'tonal body': to me there is no greater aberration."

To grasp music in its depth dimension is an art that can be learned and perfected. Categories of formal analysis here play a subordinate role - at least as important it is to be consciously aware of timbres, dynamic processes, musical characters and expressions. Following general reflections about the art of listening, the volume in hand presents exemplary work analyses. The roster of composers introduced extends from Mozart to Bernstein, that of the genres discussed from the piano piece to the opera. A detailed register and a survey of the chief works referred to make this book an indispensable companion for both scholars and laymen. About the German edition of this book: "In Floros' book all these details unite to form a magnificent mosaic. Individual works discussed meet us in an entirely new light, and we begin to decipher the language of music with a different set of tools." (Helmut Peters)