Farming Club/Life of Tchaikovsky is a sketch that appears in "Mr and Mrs Brian Norris' Ford Popular," the twenty-eighth episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus.
Synopsis[]
A presenter (Eric Idle) introduces John Cobbley (Terry Gilliam), musical and artistic director of Covent Garden, who will talk about the life of Tchaikovsky which is a pity because he is presenting Farming Club. Cobbley is taken off and the presenter continues to talk, with a picture of a pig on the slide behind him. He then introduces a farming club special, The Life of Tchaikovsky.
Footage of farm animals plays behind the scrolling intro of Farming Club's special, The Life of Peter Ilytch Tschaikowsky. A second presenter (John Cleese) says Tchaikovsky was "born in 1840 in a Ken Russell film just outside St Petersburg" and how his father, a freelance bishop, had relationships with many different women. He passes onto Maurice (Michael Palin).
Maurice colourfully describes his work. The presenters of a space-type show Tschaikowsky XXI (Graham Chapman and Terry Jones) explain Tchaikovsky's head was the same as four very large hamsters. Robin (Jones) has a model of Tchaikovsky and describes his body parts in scientific terms. The four presenters in turn pass over to Maurice, who describes his death.
The first presenter introduces Sviatoslav Richter (Jones) to play Tchaikovsky's first concerto in Bb minor while trying to escape from a sack, three padlocks and a pair of handcuffs. Richter, tied in a sack, rolls over to the piano and plays the grand chords as he gets his arms free. A glamorous assistant Rita (Julia Breck) poses by the piano as Richter shakes his legs free and finishes with a flourish.