The worst work of great music ever...or is it the greatest work of bad music ever?

One piece of classical music that I listen to fairly regularly, playing it every six months or so, is Tchaikovsky's Piano Concerto #1, which is probably one of the most-performed works in all of classical music. And listening to it, I can certainly understand why: it's got the kind of grand epic Romantic sweep that audiences love, it's got one wonderful melody after another (including one of the most famous classical melodies ever), it showcases both the full orchestra in all its glory and the virtuoso piano in all its pyrotechnic glory. Yup, I love the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto #1.

And I also hate it.

That may seem strong, but every time I hear it, I come away convinced that only the wonderful melodies (well, some of the wonderful melodies) and the work's inherent, in-your-face drama are what keeps it around. Musically, the piece is a structural nightmare.

Consider the concerto's very first melody, which is -- as mentioned above -- one of the most famous melodies in all of classical music. There's a brief intro by the horns, and then the piano starts banging those big chords as the strings sound The Melody. Then, after the strings are done, the piano itself plays The Melody. Then there's some virtuosic stuff, and then a big tutti section in which the whole orchestra sounds The Melody. And then, after a fairly awkward transition, the movement's meter and tempo change -- and The Melody is never heard again. So we've just spent five or six minutes becoming intimately familiar with a theme that Tchaikovsky just tosses aside.

There's still good stuff to be heard, but the transitions are always awkward in the Concerto Number One, with Tchaikovsky constantly seeming to build toward a certain kind of idea but then inexplicably breaking off and doing something completely different (in the middle of the first movement, there's a "building" passage that simply stops and then the timpani gives a loud roll, and we're on to something completely different).

The second movement combines both the traditional slow movement with a bit of scherzo material that does nothing for me, and again, the two distinct "voices" of the movement don't do more than simply exist side-by-side. As for the last movement, it's probably the most successful of the three. Its structure is, at least, competent.

I'm generally not bothered as much by structural faults in music; but the overall mood of the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto #1 is one of excess. In the entire forty-five minutes of the work, there isn't a single subtle gesture to be found. This concerto is a monument to musical wallowing. It's almost like Peter Ilich, in writing this piece, said to himself: "Dammit, I'm going to indulge every musical instinct I have for this thing. Piss on holding back: if the idea occurs to me, it's going in."

So why do I still listen to it? Probably because it appeals to the part of my classical music loving soul that's analogue to the part of me that likes to just grab a pizza and eat as much of it as I humanly can in one sitting.