Suite in D minor

In one of Tchaikovsky's sketchbooks for the ballet The Sleeping Beauty is a pencil note of a theme with the heading "Andante (for suite)" (TH 232 ; ČW 469). Most of the sketches for the ballet were made during the first half of 1889, and it seems likely that the theme for the suite was noted down around this time. However, the idea was not subsequently used in any of Tchaikovsky's works.

The sketch comprises 14 bars of a melody in the key of D minor. At the start is the note: "O, how short is life, and how much we suffer here" (О как жизнь коротка и как страданья здесь много) .