His father, Prince Meliton Baratashvili (1795–1860), was an impoverished nobleman working for the Russian administration.
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Eventually, Baratashvili had to enter the Russian bureaucratic service and serve as an ordinary clerk in the disease-ridden Azerbaijani town of Ganja.
Taktakishvili's works include operas, two symphonies, four piano concertos, two violin concertos and two cello concertos, the symphonic poem Mtsyri and the oratorios In the Steps of Rustaveli and Nikoloz Baratashvili.