SIKORSKI
Dmitri Shostakovitsch
9 August 2000 - 25th Anniversary of His Death

This excellent tribute page was taken from the Sirkorski home page, the page seems to be no longer available so I have archived a copy here.

Table of contents


Foreword

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Dmitri Shostakovich, born in 1906, can be regarded as the most significant Russian composer of the twentieth century, along with Igor Stravinsky and Sergei Prokofiev. Encouraged by Alexander Glazunov during his first years of study in Petrograd, he received a solid grounding under Leonid Nikolayev, among others. Despite early auspicious intentions to concentrate on piano playing, composition finally ended up receiving the lion's share of his energies. The successful premiere of his First Symphony in 1926 may have helped to confirm this decision. Shostakovich's relationship to political developments in the socialist and Stalinist Soviet Union was outwardly ambivalent.

His engagement as well as opposition to the system marked his life and personality to an extraordinary degree. Of great significance was the ban on his musical drama "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk" during the 1930s. In 1936 the notorious article in "Pravda" appeared, accusing Shostakovich of deviating from the leftist point of view, of a bourgeois, decadent stance. Remarkably, despite all disappointments and repression, the composer stood firm and reappeared before the public just one year later with his Fifth Symphony, which enjoyed a triumphant success. Following the German invasion of 1941, Shostakovich worked on his Seventh Symphony, the work that was to make his name known round the world. Especially after 1948 the composer found himself sharply attacked as a perpetrator of "Formalism", despite several Stalin prizes. Having meanwhile moved to Moscow, Shostakovich resigned the teaching position that he had held there. He distinguished himself with works that "appeared" to be exponents of Socialist Realism and withdrew more problematical works, including the First Violin Concerto and the song cycle "From Yiddish Folk Poetry".

After the death of Stalin in 1953, Shostakovich's life became more relaxed. However, he remained reserved and his behaviour difficult to assess. He was loyal to the Soviet Union and long active as Secretary of the Composers' Union of the USSR. Little by little his earlier work was revived. The opera "The Nose" was performed again, as well as the Second, Third and Fourth Symphonies. Hans Sikorski Music Publishers championed the publication of the original version of "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk", which had meanwhile become known in a "harmless" version as "Katerina Izmailova". Shostakovich visited Germany on several occasions, including West Berlin for the German premiere of his Fifteenth Symphony. He died in Moscow on 9 August 1975.

The present publication makes no attempt to be a complete guide to the works of Shostakovich. It is rather to be understood as an overview, as a stimulus to involve oneself with certain aspects of the composer's production, to become acquainted with formerly little-known works and to come to terms with the many-sided personality of this extraordinary composer.

Hans Sikorski Music Publishers have been in charge of the publication of Shostakovich's works in various territories for over forty years. For some works the publishers have obtained exclusive rights, so that "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk", for example, is represented by Sikorski worldwide. Concurrently, Sikorski has almost uninterruptedly documented the reception of Shostakovich's works within its territory and can offer information to the musicologically informed public as well as to performing musicians and the large circle of friends of Dmitri Shostakovich.

Sikorski Publishers are issuing a catalogue of the composer's works simultaneously with this publication.



Biographical Dates
(Not including dates of compositions)

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1906 Born in St. Petersburg on 12 September according to the old chronology
1915-1917 First attempts at composition
1919 Introduced to Alexander Glazunov, theory and ear training with A. Petrov, enters conservatory
1920 Performs compositions in private circles, piano studies with Leonid Nikolayev
1922 Death of father, economic hardship
1923 Preparation for piano examinations, starting in autumn pianist for silent movies while studying composition
1924 Applies for the Moscow Conservatory
1926 Teaching post for score playing at the piano at the Leningrad Musical Technical School
1927 Participates in the Warsaw Chopin Competition, beginning of friendship with Ivan Sollertinsky, meets Alban Berg
1928 Works as music dramatic advisor and pianist at the Meyerhold Theatre in Moscow
1930-33 Musical collaboration at the Leningrad Theatre of Young Workers (TRAM)
1932 Coordination of the musical organization within the Soviet Composers' Union, Shostakovich elected to the board of directors, marries Nina Vasilyevna Varsar Appointed city district representative
1936 Article "Chaos Instead of Music" appears in "Pravda" on 28 January, birth of daughter Galina
1937 In the "cleansings" of these years countless intellectuals are murdered, including many friends of the composer; appointed associate Professor of Composition at the Leningrad Conservatory
1938 Birth of son Maxim
1939 Appointed Full Professor
1941 Awarded the Stalin Prize on 16 March
1943 At the plenary assembly of the Composers' Union Prokofiev criticizes the Eighth Symphony for verbosity; Shostakovich is elected a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters (USA)
1945 Victory celebrations at Moscow's Red Square, retains residence in Moscow
1947 Again appointed Professor at the Leningrad Conservatory, appointed Chairman of the Leningrad Composers' Organization
1948 Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union condemning Soviet composers of "Formalism", renewed attacks against Muradeli, Miaskovsky, Shebalin, Prokofiev, Khachaturian and above all Shostakovich. Shostakovich loses his lectureships, the professorship at the Leningrad Conservatory is suspended due to "budget cuts". A new period of economic hardship begins.
1949 Shostakovich delegated to the "Peace Conference of International Scientists and Artists" in New York, deported from the USA
1950 Stalin Prize for film music, travels to Warsaw for the "World Council for Peace" convention, meets Hanns Eisler in East Berlin, attends festivities in Leipzig commemorating the 200th anniversary of Bach's death
1951 Deputy of the Upper Soviet of the FSFSR
1952 Visits Berlin, Leipzig and Dresden
1953 Death of Stalin on 5 March
1954 Meets Bertolt Brecht in Berlin at the convention of the "World Council for Peace"
1956 Honorary Member of the Accademia Santa Cecilia in Rome, marries the teacher Margarita Andreyevna Kainova, divorced in 1959
1958 Named Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Music, receives Honorary Doctorate from Oxford University as well as the International Jean Sibelius Prize in Helsinki
1959 An incurable chronic inflammation of the spinal cord is diagnosed, resulting in paralysis of the right hand
1960 Elected First Secretary of the Composers' Union of the RSFSR
1961 Hospitalisation and sanatorium convalescence
1962 Deputy of the Upper Soviet of the USSR, marries Irina Antonovna Supinskaya
1963 Member of UNESCO's International Music Council
1965 Honorary Member of the Serbian Academy of the Arts
1966 Suffers heart attack, elected to the Nationalities Soviet of the USSR, meets Anna Akhmatova, sixtieth birthday celebrations in Moscow, Dresden and Sofia, awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society
1967 Hospitalisation following a complicated fracture of the leg, receives the Great Silver Award of the Republic of Austria
1968 Corresponding member of the Bavarian Academy of Fine Arts
1969 Repeated stays in hospital, travels to Siberia, People's Artist of the Autonomous Buryat-Mongolian Soviet Republic
1970 Mozart Memorial Medal of the Viennese Mozart Society, hospitalisation in Kurgan
1971 Second heart attack
1973 Sojourn in the German Democratic Republic in February, travels to Denmark and the USA, Honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts in Chicago, Léonie Sonning Music Prize in Denmark
1974 Elected Deputy of the Upper Nationalities Council of the USSR
1975 Sanatorium convalescence, after a short return to the Dacha Shukovka back in Kunzevo Hospital, dies on 9 August, funeral on 14 August at the Novodevichi cloister cemetery

Bach and Shostakovitsch

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The year 2000 is marked by the anniversaries of the deaths of two composers who have more to do with one other than is apparent at first glance.

Johann Sebastian Bach, in whose work the formal richness and expressive power of the musical Baroque reach perfection, has had an impact on our own epoch far exceeding that of any other composer of earlier times. On 28 July 2000 we commemorate the 250th anniversary of his death.

Johann Sebastian Bach, in whose work the formal richness and expressive power of the musical Baroque reach perfection, has had an impact on our own epoch far exceeding that of any other composer of earlier times. On 28 July 2000 we commemorate the 250th anniversary of his death.

The relationship with Bach is especially striking in contemporary Russian music. In her great violin concerto "Offertorium" Sofia Gubaidulina uses formal and thematic ideas from Bach; besides this, she composed a Meditation on the Bach Chorale "Vor deinem Thron tret ich hiermit". Viktor Yekimovsky, in his "Brandenburg Concerto" (Comp. 29, 1979), and Rodion Shchedrin, in his "Musical Offering" even go so far as to use Bach's original titles, to say nothing of the musical coded messages of the note succession B-A-C-H in numerous compositions of the twentieth century, by composers from Shostakovich to Schnittke to Pärt.

Interestingly, Shostakovich was occasionally criticized by the contradictory Russian musical press for his close relationship with Bach and other composers of the eighteenth century. The following appeared in the periodical Sovietskaya Musyka 1/1948:

A peculiar ciphering and abstraction of musical language often conceals forms and emotions in the background which are foreign to Soviet realistic art: expressionistic exaggeration, nervousness, a turning to the world of degenerate, repulsive, pathological manifestations. (...) "Neoclassical" tendencies in the work of Shostakovich and his imitators - the resurrection of intonations and compositional methods of Bach, Händel, Haydn and others, used in a twisted, decadent way - offer one means of flight from reality.

In the year 1950, the 200th anniversary of the death of Bach was the occasion for Shostakovich's intensive involvement with the Baroque composer, resulting in a series of works reflecting this involvement. Leipzig was at that time the focal point of the international Bach festivities. Shostakovich made a personal appearance - it was his second visit to East Germany - as a member of a twenty-seven-man Soviet delegation. He presented a lecture on Bach that was published in numerous German periodicals. Among other things Shostakovich said:

I feel especially close to the musical genius of Bach. It is impossible to pass him by indifferently. On every occasion I listen to his music with great benefit and enormous interest. I listen to many of his works repeatedly. And each time I discover new, beautiful passages. Bach plays a significant role in my life. Each day I play a work of his. This is a genuine need, and the daily contact with Bach's music gives me enormous returns.

Shostakovich told his German composer colleagues how stimulating it would be to continue the tradition of the "Well-Tempered Clavier". After his return to the Soviet Union he put his plan into action. At first he intended to write polyphonic exercises, but soon changed his mind and composed a two-part cycle entitled 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87 between October 1950 and February 1951. Although the individual piano pieces do apparently form a cycle, Shostakovich regarded the components as a series of unconnected pieces.


Shostakovichs works with reference to Bach

Ed. 2362 24 Preludes, Op. 34 for Piano
Ed. 2124 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87 for Piano, Nos. 1-12, Vol. 1
Ed. 2188 24 Preludes and Fugues, Op. 87 for Piano, Nos. 13-24, Vol. 2
Ed. 2329 Passacaglia from Op. 29 for Organ
Ed. 2323 19 Preludes from Op. 34 for Violin and Piano (Zyganow)
Ed. 2216 Five Pieces: Prelude, Gavotte, Elegy, Waltz and Polka for 2 Violins and Piano (Atovmian)
Ed. 2269 Prelude and Scherzo, Op. 11 for String Quartet (score)
Ed. 2270 Prelude and Scherzo, Op. 11 for String Octet (parts)

Shostakovich the Symphonist

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The fifteen symphonies of Shostakovich are the backbone of his oeuvre, revealing aspects of his life in thematic, programmatic and stylistic characteristics. They also serve as milestones marking different stylistic phases in the composer's output. Above all in the genres of the string quartet and the symphony, he attempted to come to grips with his state of mind and life situation in musical terms.

For the most part, Shostakovich continued the great symphonic tradition, as far as instrumentation, harmonic language and polyphony are concerned. Just nineteen years old, he attracted the attention of the musical world with his First Symphony, Op. 10 in 1924. This work was remarkably successful and was soon performed in the West.


During the following period, the composer attempted several new compositional techniques that he had already used in his improvisations as a silent movie piano accompanist. During these early years, Shostakovich frequently composed in a boldly illustrative, programmatic style. In those days, the path towards a revolutionary art with modernistic and futuristic ideas seemed prepared, although Shostakovich never embraced these tendencies as wholeheartedly as did certain of his contemporaries, such as Alexander Mossolov or Arthur Lourié. The next two symphonies were without doubt compositionally weaker than the first, although they were initially received with great interest.

The Second Symphony "October", Op. 14 (1927), sets a text by Alexander Besymensky and includes a choir. The immediate occasion for its composition was a commission from a state institution, the music publisher "Mus-sektor", to compose a symphonic work commemorating the tenth anniversary of the October revolution. Although the composer was far from convinced by the quality of Besymensky's poem - he bluntly denounced it as "very bad" (Krzysztof Meyer: Shostakovich Lubbe Verlag, 1995, p. 109) - he accepted the commission. The symphony is strikingly brief, with the choir only making its appearance at the end of the twenty-minute work.

When the Third Symphony "The First of May", Op. 20 was written, Stalin rose to power. Shostakovich now fell into the despotic clutches of the cynical party. Soon the infamous article "Chaos Instead of Music" appeared in "Pravda", fiercely denouncing the opera "Lady Macbeth" and resulting in a life-threatening predicament for the composer, who was thereafter labelled an "enemy of the people".

Regarding the Fourth Symphony, Op. 43 (1935), Krzysztof Meyer (ibid, p. 237) writes: The Fourth Symphony is gigantic. The instrumental forces correspond to those of two normal symphony orchestras. The ex-position of the first movement is 476 bars long and lasts longer than Shostakovich's Seventh String Quartet; its scope is comparable to that of the first two movements of his Ninth Symphony. This giant movement is composed according to the rules of sonata form, as is, similarly, the next movement, the Scherzo. Only the Finale is cast in a form that has no classical antecedents.
This symphony, incidentally, long withdrawn by the composer, is regarded by not a few experts as Shostakovich's greatest.

The Fifth Symphony, Op. 47 (1937) can be interpreted as the expression of deep, torturous thoughts that plagued people during this anxious time. For the first time in Shostakovich's music, multi-layered connections to great composers of the past are evident. The influence of Johann Sebastian Bach is obvious. Beethoven's romantic contrast effects belong just as much to Shostakovich's philosophy as does the symphonic dramaturgy of Tchaikovsky's and Mussorgsky's orchestral writing, which Shostakovich adapted. A great interest in the works of Gustav Mahler made an immediate imprint on Shostakovich. These elements were to be further developed and brought to fruition in the following works, especially in the Seventh Symphony.

The Sixth Symphony, Op. 54 (1939) doubtless represents a break with the conventional order of movements. An unusually slow movement, a Largo, opens the work. Progressively faster movements then follow, an Allegro and a Presto, both of which taken together require but half of the playing time of the first movement.

The Seventh Symphony, Op. 60 and the Eighth Symphony, Op. 65 originated under the immediate shadow of the Second World War; they are therefore reactions to the events of that time. With these works, Shostakovich gave vent to his deep dismay, just as he did in the Eighth String Quartet, which is dedicated to the victims of Fascism.

In 1995 Sabine Siemon wrote the following about the Eighth Symphony: It was composed during the summer months of 1943 and was premiered in Moscow on 3 November 1943 under the baton of its dedicatee, Yev-geny Mravinsky on the occasion of the anniversary celebrations of the October Revolution. If the subject of the Seventh was struggle, then the Eighth is far more determined by the present tragedy, reflecting suffering and pain. In a broad and apparently endless stream of melody, with an underlying funeral-march rhythm in the low strings, the composer portrays, already in the first movement, the sorrow and revolt of the tortured human being. The climax is formed by a mighty, static sound texture in triple forte, used by Shostakovich since his opera "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk" as a "motif of ghastly horror". Several ascents of the meanwhile alienated initial melody (it has been transformed into a military march) repeatedly reach their peak in this "motif". The mourning of the English horn, a recitative, takes over, and the movement concludes with a restatement of the main theme. The Trio of the following scherzo-like Allegretto belongs to Shostakovich's typical marionette and circus dance music by virtue of its instrumentation, with piccolo, contrabassoon and E-flat clarinet. It represents musical grotesquery, taking on ever more violent features with its repetition in the strings, trombone and tuba. Already in the first bars of the dramatic middle movement, Allegro non troppo, the listener is spellbound by a regularly pulsing figure in the strings. The irregular interjections from the wind instruments in front of the background of this unchanging ostinato, together with a dialogue between two trumpets accompanied by can-can dance motifs in the strings have the effect of musical depictions of war machinery. The third movement moves on into a reflective elegy, Largo, in the form of a passacaglia. The violoncelli and double basses repeat the main theme twelve times; it connects with ever new, expressive melodic lines. The Allegretto-Finale follows immediately, attacca. Further chamber music passages follow the main theme in the bassoon: a cantilena in the strings, a cheerful staccato theme played by a solo flute, a waltz in the celli and a fugato on a chromatic theme. The movement reaches its peak in a reminiscence of the "motif of ghastly horror" from the first movement. After the return of the chamber music episodes, the symphony culminates in a C major chord in a high register and a three-note motif out of which the main themes of all the movements (except the third) have developed: the motto of the symphony.

The following symphonies fall into a period in which the content of Shostakovich's music was strongly determined by programmatic factors and repeatedly makes use of the human voice. Here we find many references to newer music, including direct quotations from works by other composers or the use of a twelve-note row. The climax of this series of works is the Fifteenth Symphony, Op. 141.

The Ninth Symphony, Op. 70 was written over a period of a year and a half. Without offering any detailed explanations, the composer abruptly ceased work on it in 1944, after having completed the exposition of the first movement. In August 1945 he resumed work on the composition, finishing it within a few weeks. The brief first movement, modelled very closely on early classical forms, proved surprising and unexpected to Shostakovich connoisseurs. The remaining movements are also notable for their simplicity.

Eight years separated the composition of the Ninth Symphony, Op. 70 from the Tenth Symphony, Op. 93. Although no text lies at the root of it, the Tenth does indeed seem to contain an unwritten programme. According to the composer, it signifies a coming to terms with Stalinism.

The emotional intensity and gripping dramaturgy of the composer's symphonic language is maintained in the Eleventh Symphony, Op. 103. Shostakovich frees himself here from all structural conventionalities of the form, thus creating a large-scale symphonic poem making use of several revolutionary songs.

In the Twelfth Symphony, Op. 112 Shostakovich refers to "the year 1917", while the Thirteenth Symphony, Op. 113 (with choir) and the Fourteenth Symphony, Op. 135 (with soprano and bass soloists) continue to extend his concept of the symphony through vocal means.

In 1960 Shostakovich, aged fifty-four, became a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The Symphonies No. 11 ("The Year 1905") and No. 12 ("The Year 1917") were regarded as paragons of Socialist Realism. Dedicated to his country's revolutionary past, they reveal Shostakovich's high ideals in regard to the social and ideological responsibilities of the composer - a philosophy reminiscent of the noble, equally abstract ideals of the early Enlightenment in its self-denying rigour. To what extent Shostakovich identified with the communist party is immaterial; the tendencies towards liberalization must have strengthened his hopes in the government's capacity for improvement, at least for a time. In spite of, or perhaps because of this, he chose poems by the then barely thirty-year-old Yevgeny Yevtushenko for his Thirteenth Symphony, a poet who was regarded with distrust by the officials. His poem "Babi Yar" had appeared in September 1961 and created a sensation. In his posthumously published memoirs, as related to Solomon Volkov, Shostakovich said: The poem astounded me. It astounded thousands of people. Many had heard about Babi Yar, but it took Yevtushenko's poem to make them aware of it. They tried to destroy the memory of Babi Yar, first the Germans and then the Ukrainian government. But after Yevtushenko's poem, it became clear that it would never be forgotten.
Yevtushenko's poem was not only a requiem for the murdered Jews, but at the same time a dramatically rousing warning against anti-Semitism in his own country and throughout the world. Shostakovich also bore this in mind: It would be good if Jews could live peacefully and happily in Russia, where they were born. But we must never forget about the dangers of anti- Semitism and keep reminding others of it, because the infection is alive and who knows if it will ever disappear. The context in which the Babi Yar poem is integrated within the symphony proves that the composer's concern was focussed upon this topical, present-day problem. Only the first movement was based on "Babi Yar"; for the other four movements Shostakovich chose poems whose themes related directly to everyday life of the present day.

In 1969 Shostakovich stated in a Pravda interview, interlarded with the usual political phrases, that he had had ideas in mind for the Fourteenth Symphony, Op. 135 since 1962. I orchestrated Mussorgsky's vocal cycle "Songs and Dances of Death", a magnificent work ... Perhaps one should take one's courage in one's hands and try to continue the cycle, I thought ... I was staggered at the depth, wisdom and artistic expressive power with which the 'eternal subjects' of love, life and death are treated, although I approach these subjects differently in my symphony. Shostakovich cast his symphony, dedicated to Benjamin Britten, as an eleven-part vocal cycle concentrating on the subject of death by means of poems by F. G. Lorca (2), G. Apollinaire (7), W. Küchelbecker (1) and R. M. Rilke (2). The instrumentation is unusual and untypical for Shostakovich up to that time: there are no winds; next to a small string orchestra is a group containing percussion instruments that had either never been used by Shostakovich before (vibraphone) or had been infrequently used in general. Some movements are even determined by the sound of percussion, in the literal sense of the word "beating". In the fifth part there is a refrain-like return of a fanfare-like twelve-note melody in the xylo-phone, not ritually used as in Schönberg, but rather intuitively in the sense of Adorno's statement that "de- ceased bones make the most colourful music". In the wild orchestral postlude of the macabre "Malaguena" the effect of the percussion is atmospheric, in that castanets portray Death dancing in the tavern. Claves make a ghostly effect in the prison scene of the seventh song: the unbearable waiting for one's own execution is intensified by special effects in the strings (pizzicati and strings struck by the wood of the bow). Two loud bell strokes interrupt the calls with which the knight warns the blonde witch in "Lorelei"; soft bells, together with vibraphone and celesta, announce the arrival of the lover and the death of Lorelei. Again by means of two chime strokes a moment of frenzy breaks through in 'Suicide', before the movement sinks into the desolation of the opening.

The Fifteenth Symphony, Op. 141 can hardly be exceeded in its richness of contrast as well as in its extraordinary economy of means. Meyer writes: (ibid. p. 501) The first thing to mention here is the overall formal-stylistic conception, beginning with the grotesquely optimistic opening, followed by an Adagio imbued with sadness, leading into a dry, somewhat bitter Scherzo and concluding with a pathetic Finale which ends in pianissimo.

The reaction to Shostakovich's symphonies fluctuated greatly. Many of them aroused bewilderment, even irritation. For example, Stalin had expected a sort of hymn or monument from Shostakovich in his Ninth Symphony, Op. 70 after the end of the war. The symphony, of course, turned out entirely differently - a miniature, transparent, yet in its meaning a complex chamber music-like symphony, clearly opposing monumental glorification.

In terms of their content, the symphonies have something of a common leitmotif: the disclosure of terror and inhumanity, and the preservation of humanity in the face of violence. Lev Mazel writes about the humanistic idea of the unmasking of evil and the defence of humankind in his article About Shostakovich's Symphonies. Thus, the recitative-like pathetic "March of Evil" in the first movement of the Fifth Symphony is illuminated and transformed into a positive statement in the recapitulation. One finds other such examples in the last symphonies. The central themes here are the unmasking of anti-Semitism, of war and of militarism.

Study scores of the symphonies of Shostakovich

Ed. 2224 Symphony No. 1 op. 10
Ed. 2225 Symphony No.2 op. 14 "October"
Ed. 2226 Symphony No. 3 op. 20 "The First of May"
Ed. 2218
Ed. 2227 Symphony No. 5 op. 47
Ed. 2228 Symphony No. 6 op. 54
Ed. 2229 Symphony No. 7 op. 60 "Leningrad"
Ed. 2221 Symphony No. 8 op. 65
Ed. 2220 Symphony No. 9 op. 70
Ed. 2219 Symphony No. 10 op. 93
Ed. 2217 Symphony No. 11 op. 103 "The Year 1905"
Ed. 2210 Symphony No. 12 op. 112 "The Year 1917"
Ed. 2207 Symphony No. 13 op. 113
Ed. 2174 Symphony No. 14 op. 135
Ed. 2172 Symphony No. 15 op. 141

Other Orchestral Works, Instrumental Concertos and Orchestrations

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The orchestra and the high art of instrumentation are of crucial importance in the creative work of Shostakovich. Without question, the composer continued along traditional paths. His orchestra resembled that of Gustav Mahler to some extent, although he placed great emphasis on the percussion in many works. The keyboard instruments - celesta, piano and even organ - are often prominent.

Shostakovich's style is often characterized by an angular, sharply accentuated expression. A certain grotesqueness makes itself heard, especially in the scherzi. The composer frequently works with especially exposed instruments such as the piccolo, expanding the expressive possibilities of instruments in the extreme ranges. He is able to hear new possibilities in the instruments, to emphasize their character, to bring them into bold relief, to use them as colour.

Shostakovich's numerous instrumentations and orchestrations of other composers' works bear witness to the subtlety of his approach to the orchestra. The most popular example is probably the opera Boris Godunov by Modest Mussorgsky. Besides this, Shostakovich orchestrated Mussorgsky's Khovanshchina and completed the one-act opera Rothschild's Violin, left unfinished by his pupil Benjamin Fleishman, who had been killed in the war.

He transcribed the Flohlied from Goethe's "Faust" by Ludwig van Beethoven for bass and orchestra, a Pastorale and a Capriccio of Domenico Scarlatti for 14 winds, the Concerto for Cello and Orchestra by Robert Schumann, die Polka Vergnügungszug by Johann Strauss for orchestra and the world-famous Tahiti-Trot from "Tea for Two" from the musical "No, No, Nanette" by Vincent Miller Youman.

Among the shorter orchestral works by Shostakovich, the Scherzo in F-sharp minor, Op. 1 (1920), the Five Fragments, Op. 42 (1935) and the Festive Overture, Op. 96 (1954) deserve special mention.

The symphonies and ballet suites are by far the best known and most successful of Shostakovich's orchestral works. But the concertos (two each for piano, violin and cello respectively) are also of crucial importance. The medium of the concerto accompanied the composer from the beginning until the end of his compositional career. The Second Violin Concerto, Op. 129 was composed in 1967 and, like the First Violin Concerto, Op. 77 of 1947, was dedicated to David Oistrakh. The violinist later remarked that the second concerto had been intended for his sixtieth birthday, but that the composer had erroneously delivered it one year too soon. Thus the premiere took place, Oistrakh's birthday notwithstanding, on 26 September 1967 in Moscow. An effective, virtuoso display piece for the solo instrument was far from Shostakovich's intention in this late work. His customary erratic, spasmodic musical characterizations are also missing from this work. Instead we find a lyrical, gently flowing music with strong thematic development as well as sections of dramatic intensification.

Like the first, Shostakovich's Second Cello Concerto, Op. 126 was dedicated to Mstislav Rostropovich. He never ceased to express his admiration for this cellist. Rostropovich, he maintained, was a truly Russian person: he knows everything, can do everything, understands everything.

The work was written within a few months during the spring of 1966, during a time in which Shostakovich's health continually plagued him. He completed it in a sanatorium in Yalta shortly before suffering a heart attack. By the time of the premiere he had sufficiently recovered to be able to attend the performance. This took place on 25 September at the Moscow Conservatory, with Rostropovich as soloist, on the occasion of the composer's sixtieth birthday. The composer received a tumultuous ovation.

Before the premiere, shortly after completing the work, Shostakovich offered the following commentary in a letter to Isaac Davidovich Glikman: Since this work contains neither a literary text nor a programme, it is not easy for me to write anything about it. It is written on a large scale. It has three movements, with the second and third joined together without interruption. In the second movement and at the climax of the third, there is a theme that bears a strong resemblance to the Odessa song "Buy Rings"! I cannot for the life of me explain how this happened. But it is very similar.

The Concerto for Piano, Trumpet and Orchestra, Op. 35 of 1933, generally known as the First Piano Concerto, sounds quite differently. It is a kaleidoscope of expressive nuances, a sweeping virtuoso work of the highest quality. The composer himself called it "Concerto for Piano with the Accompaniment of String Orchestra and Trumpet", intending it as a "first attempt to fill a large gap in the Soviet Instrumental repertoire, which lacks strong concertante works". He avoided the usual three-movement scheme by writing two slow central movements joined together without break. In the first movement he composed a chain-like form, instead of a sonata form, in which a theme appears in multiply transformed guises and in varying modes of expression. On the one hand Shostakovich refers back to the pre-classical period in his relatively small ensemble and his practice (originating in the Concerto grosso) of pitting several instruments against the orchestra. On the other, terse musical materials refer to Haydn and Mozart, with certain other aspects stemming from the piano concertos of Chopin, Tchaikovsky and Prokofiev. This work did in fact strongly influence Russian music during the post- Shostakovich era.

The Second Piano Concerto, Op. 102 was composed in 1957 for his son Maxim, who was nineteen at the time. After the tragic Tenth Symphony and other works reflecting the horrors of the war years, this carefree and transparent work seemed like a sigh of relief. The size of the orchestra, excepting the four horns and tambourine, does not exceed that of Haydn or early Beethoven. The cheerful, quick outer movements frame a lyrical Andante. The two Allegro movements stand in stark contrast to this. In the brilliant Finale with its two themes (one of which is in 7/8) the composer lets us in for a musical joke: he quotes from a dry finger exercise by Hanon with which he had introduced his son to the fundamentals of piano playing years before.

Selected orchestral works and instrumental concertos
(in some cases including information on printed single editions*)


without Ed. Five Fragments for Orchestra, Op. 42
Ed. 6234 Festive Overture, Op. 96
without Ed. Overture on Russian and Kirgihz Themes, Op. 115
without Ed. Symphonic Poem "October", Op. 131
Ed. 2361 Concerto for Piano, Trumpet and String Orchestra in C minor, Op. 35
Ed. 6214 Concerto No. 1 for Violin and Orchestra in A minor, Op. 77
Ed. 2241 Concerto No. 2 for Violin and Orchestra in C-sharp minor, Op. 129
Ed. 6621 Concerto No. 2 for Piano and Orchestra in F major, Op. 102
Ed. 2335 Concerto No. 1 for Cello and Orchestra in E-flat major, Op. 107
Ed. 2355 Concerto No. 2 for Cello and Orchestra in G major, Op. 126
*) All works of Shostakovich exist in printed form in the definitive Complete Edition, which is distributed by Sikorski worldwide. The issues named here have been published separately.
Die hier genannten Editionen sind einzeln erschienen.



The String Quartets

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The idea in music is what makes it strong, as well as the thought, the generalization behind it, Shostakovich once said. In the string quartet, the thought must be profound and the idea pure. With 15 works, the medium of the string quartet takes on an importance equal to that of the symphony in Shostakovich's production. In substance and content, the string quartets are of equal quality as well. Characteristically, the well-known Russian violist and conductor Rudolf Barshai has added several excellent orchestral transcriptions of some of the Shostakovich quartets to the symphonic repertoire. He arranged the Tenth String Quartet, Op. 118 and the legendary Eighth String Quartet, Op. 110 for string orchestra and the Third String Quartet, Op. 73 for strings and woodwinds, as well as the Fourth String Quartet, Op. 83.

Sigrid Neef once proposed the thesis that Shostakovich's string quartets hardly reveal a development from tentative early works to the late maturity of age. One must not forget that the string quartets did not originate chronologically parallel to the symphonies. Shostakovich did not write his first string quartet until 1938, after the completion of the phenomenal Fifth Symphony, at a time, therefore, when he had already reached his first compositional zenith. He made the following remarks on the First String Quartet, Op. 49: I have written a quartet comprising four short movements. I began writing it without any particular thoughts or feelings and didn't expect that much would come of it. A quartet is, after all, one of the most difficult musical genres. I wrote the first movement as a kind of exercise and never thought of completing it, let alone publishing it ... The work so captivated me that I finished it un- believably quickly. One should not search for any particular profundity in this first quartet. It is cheerful, happy and lyrical. I would call it "Spring-like". This C major quartet stands at the beginning of a series that is unsurpassed for profundity and expressive strength in the twentieth century. The composer must not have regarded this more or less occasional work, as he himself regarded it, as indifferently as all that. He did after all change the order of the movements after hearing it for the first time.

The real leap in this genre occurred six years later with the Second String Quartet, Op. 68, a grand work (along with the Fifteenth, it is the longest of the series), with which Shostakovich counterbalanced the lapidary terseness of the First Quartet. Even the titles of the individual movements - "Overture", "Recitative and Romance" - refer to a Baroque sweeping gesture, to motor rhythms and operatic drama.

After the neoclassical orientation of the String Quartet No. 1 and the tribute to the Russian homeland of the String Quartet No. 2, the Third String Quartet, Op. 73 articulates a synthesis of both streams. The composer may not have seen anything "programmatic" in this, rather more a self-realization in a rigorous linearity than was applicable to the reserved First Quartet. A reflection of the times is here not to be overheard, more so than was possible in the folkloristic tone of the Second Quartet. This is all the more obvious when one notes the originality of the fugal unfolding of the first movement, or the threnodic involvement of the third movement of the Third Quartet.

Like the Third Quartet, the Fifth was dedicated to the Beethoven quartet. This must be mentioned not only to acknowledge the artists who were so important for Shostakovich's chamber music, but also because the dedication throws some light on the actual content of this quartet. The ensemble had become acquainted at the Moscow Conservatory in 1925, thus initiating a fifty-year artistic collaboration.

Like the Third, the Fifth String Quartet, Op. 92 is an opulent, complex work, worthy of the mastery of the world famous ensemble. Moreover, the Fifth Quartet is cut from symphonic material; for the first time in Shostakovich's quartets the cyclic idea is consequently realized. One external feature points to this: all three movements are played without a break, seamlessly (Shostakovich had already connected the final movements to their preceding movements in the Third and Fourth Quartets), together resulting in a large overall tripartite form. A motivic connection indicates this as well: the exposed viola motif C-D-E-flat-B-C-sharp in the first movement, with a characteristic dotted rhythm, permeates the entire work like an idée fixe. It already contains Shostakovich's initials (D-S-C-H; S=Es being the German designation for E- flat, H being B), which come out unabashedly to the fore in the Eighth Quartet.

Shostakovich frequently used the medium of the string quartet to express his personal moods, as it were to musically reflect his life situation as it then stood. Whereas the Sixth String Quartet, Op. 101 in G major, written in the composer's fiftieth year, originated during a happy period of his life when the political situation had relaxed to some extent (the thaw had set in), the Seventh String Quartet, Op. 108 in F-sharp minor and the Eleventh String Quartet, Op. 122 in F minor are to be understood as a kind of requiem music. The composer dedicated his Seventh Quartet to the memory of his wife Nina, who had died in 1954, and the Eighth to the memory of Vassily Shirinsky, a friend of his youth.

Shostakovich's music practically begs for an interpretation, and often enough the composer offers us hints. Thus he dedicated the Eighth String Quartet, Op. 110 in C minor, undoubtedly one of his most significant quartets, to the victims of Fascism and war. According to Shostakovich's daughter Galina, the composer is said to have dedicated the work to himself. The work was written in the summer of 1960 during a period of convalescence in Gohrisch near Dresden. In December 1959 the doctors had diagnosed an incurable inflammation of the spinal cord. The four-note motif D-S-C-H, consisting of the composer's initials, is vital for all the movements of the quartet, and generates the form especially in the first and final movements. Shostakovich had already used this motif in the First Violin Concerto (1949) and in the Tenth Symphony (1953). But in the Eighth Quartet it occupies the centre of the stage.

The Ninth String Quartet, Op. 117 appeared just four years later in 1964. It was dedicated to the composer's third, young wife Irina Antonova yet to a certain extent continues the line of thought of the Eighth Quartet. Here we also find the following: echoes of the Yiddish melos, but also of Bach's tone of mourning in the Passions ("Ich will bei meinem Jesu wachen"), a reminiscence of Wagner's "Walküre" in the third movement, references to his own Ninth Symphony in the fourth movement. The composer attempts to dissolve the division into movements by the use of attacca directions. Striking too are the vehement penetrations into the territory of "micro-melos", of "micro-motifs" and of the static structures of expanded time.

In the spring of 1966 Shostakovich wrote his Eleventh String Quartet, Op. 122, a new musical memorial, a monument to Vassily Shirinsky, second violinist of Moscow's Beethoven Quartet since its founding and participant in the premieres of the Quartets Nos. 2-10.
The suite-like order of the seven miniature movements corresponds to Shostakovich's long established and ever evolving principle of form in music. Five inner movements present a series of five basic types of movement already repeatedly treated by the composer in previous quartets: Scherzo (Allegretto), Recitative (Adagio), Etude (Allegro), Humoresque (Allegro) and Elegy (Adagio). These are framed by an Introduction (Andantino) and a Conclusion (Moderato).

Two more years passed before the appearance of the Twelfth String Quartet, Op. 133, completed on 13 March 1968 and dedicated to the first violinist of the Beethoven Quartet, Dmitri Mikhailovich Zyganov. The premiere took place on 14 September of that year. During this time Shostakovich toyed with the idea of composing a cycle of 24 quartets: one for each key. The Twelfth Quartet reveals extreme sparseness of texture. Polyphonic exercises result in expansion of the perception of time, by turns Bach and Leos Janácek taking part in the dialogue. At the end repeated major chords drive the point home.

Shostakovich rarely missed the chance to dedicate one of his later string quartets to a particular person close to him. In the nine years between his first heart attack and his death, under constant medical supervision and unable to put on or button his coat without help, he composed two symphonies, four string quartets, a violin concerto, two sonatas, four song cycles, as well as film and ballet music. However, he did not want to dedicate his final and lengthiest string quartet to anyone. This work incorporated themes from aphoristic compositions of his youth. I don't want any more dedications ... When I dedicated the Thirteenth Quartet to Borissovsky, my friend died shortly afterwards. Death is circling round me, taking one after another from me, dear people, colleagues from my youth ...

The String Quartets Nos. 7-13 were composed during the decade 1960-1970. As Heinrich Lindlar remarks in his essay, "Shostakovich the Quartet Composer" (in "Dmitri Shostakovich: Documents, Interpretation, Programme", Duisburg 1984): This was a decade of increasing confrontation with the question of compositional technique and of the expressive content of his music. This is reflected in the macrocosm of the symphonies as well as in the microcosm of the string quartets. It comes to a peak in the pair of Symphonies Nos. 14 and 15 (Op. 135 and 141) from the years 1970 and 1971 and in the pair of String Quartets Nos. 12 and 13 (Op. 133 and 138) from the years 1968 and 1970; the mourning of the "Adagio" Quartet No. 13 corresponds to the "Songs of Death" Symphony No. 14 written during the same year; the interweaving, magically sonic effect of the structured twelve-note rows in the String Quartet No. 12 corresponds very closely to the artistry of tonic-rooted row technique in the Fifteenth Symphony. Besides this, the two pairs of works seem saturated with references to Tristan-like chromaticism and apocalyptic forces. Late works: are they an acknowledgement of farewell?

During his final years Shostakovich's language becomes more intimate, stricter, bleaker. In no work is this tendency more apparent than in his final quartet, the Fifteenth, in E-flat minor, Op. 144, a work regarded by many as the composer's private requiem.

When Shostakovich completed the Fifteenth String Quartet, Op. 144 in May 1974, he did not know that it would be his last. He had after all imagined a cycle of 24 quartets, one in each major and minor key, some-thing quite new in the history of music. Although he was thinking about a sixteenth quartet shortly before his death in August 1975, in the summer of 1974 he seemed to doubt whether he would ever hear a performance of his last work. As fate would have it, another tragic event took place before the premiere. Shostakovich had entrusted his work to the Beethoven Quartet, whose members could look back upon a long and fruit-ful collaboration with the composer and who had already premiered all of his previous quartets. The death of the cellist, Sergei Shirinsky, interrupted the rehearsals. Thus the honour of the premiere fell upon the Taneyev Quartet. The premiere took place on 15 November 1974 in Leningrad in the presence of the composer.

The form of the Fifteenth Quartet is unusual. All six movements, played uninterruptedly without a break, bear the tempo indication Adagio. The fifth Movement, Funeral March, offers the only contrast in tempo: it is markedly slower (Adagio molto) than the other movements. The unusual uniformity of tempo corresponds to the unified key of E-flat minor that dominates the entire work. Within these apparent limitations, Shostakovich nonetheless achieves a remarkable variety and contrast.

Printed editions of the string quartets of Dmitri Shostakovich

PARTS
Ed. 2242 String Quartet No. 1 op. 49
Ed. 2162 String Quartet No. 2 op. 68
Ed. 2243 String Quartet No. 3 op. 73
Ed. 2244 String Quartet No. 4 op. 83
Ed. 2253 String Quartet No. 5 op. 92
Ed. 2254 String Quartet No. 6 op. 101
Ed. 2263 String Quartet No. 7 op. 108
Ed. 2140 String Quartet No. 8 op. 110
Ed. 2213 String Quartet No. 9 op. 117
Ed. 2214 String Quartet No. 10 op. 118
Ed. 2264 String Quartet No. 11 op. 122
Ed. 2164 String Quartet No. 12 op. 133
Ed. 2170 String Quartet No. 13 op. 138
Ed. 2175 String Quartet No. 14 op. 142
Ed. 2204 String Quartet No. 15 op. 144
STUDYSCORES
Ed. 2265 String Quartets Nos. 1 - 4
Ed. 2266 String Quartets Nos. 5 - 8
Ed. 2267 String Quartets Nos. 9 and 10
Ed. 2268 String Quartets Nos. 11 and 12
Ed. 2209 String Quartets Nos. 13 and 15



Remarks on the Chamber Music

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Shostakovich once said to Vissarion Shebalin: ...the lightning speed at which I compose unsettles me. This is surely bad. One shouldn't write as quickly as I do. This is, after all, a serious process, and therefore one shouldn't 'gallop' (as a well-known ballerina used to say). I compose terribly fast and can't put on the brakes. (...) As soon as I have finished a work, I'm no longer so sure that the time was well spent. But the silly habit wins the upper hand, and I keep on composing in the same way.

Shostakovich did work unusually rapidly and dispensed with subsequent revisions. This could be seen as evidence of the clarity and sureness of his conception and imagination, the fact that he only needed to write the work down once it had matured in his mind. On the other hand, it reveals an example of Shostakovich's typical attitude and approach to his own work. Once a work was finished, it was a closed entity to him that obeyed its own laws. How the work would sound in an interpretation was beyond the composer's control. At any rate, it never caused Shostakovich to subsequently revise a work.

This attitude towards his compositions applies to all media in which Shostakovich made a contribution. Numerous chamber works and song cycles as well as operas are in no way inferior to his symphonic achievements. But still, the orchestra and the art of instrumentation were Shostakovich's home territory.

In the String Quartets, the Quintets, Piano Trios and instrumental Sonatas, the composer puts structural models to the test that would later reappear in the orchestral works. Shostakovich did indeed know how to combine the most heterogeneous elements to form his unified musical language. These range from twelve-note structures to Hindemith's thematic clarity to the angular, often deeply lyrical expression found in Prokofiev's ballets. This variety made a broad spectrum of traditional and contemporary possibilities available to Shostakovich: profound reflection, cheerful humour extending to grotesque distortion, but also strongly expressive emphasis.

It need hardly surprise us to find out that many of Shostakovich's chamber works originated in contacts and acquaintances with contemporary performers. For example, the Cello Sonata, Op. 40 from the 1930's was the result of his friendship with the cellist Viktor Kubatsky. This work, written in a rather traditional, lyrical and melodic style, and completed within a few weeks, has found a strong echo among cellists. It quickly established itself in the concert halls of the world. Gregor Piatagorsky and Pierre Fournier were among the first artists to popularise the work in the West.

The Piano Quintet in G minor, Op. 57 was written before the outbreak of the war at the request of the first violinist of the Beethoven Quartet, Dmitri Zyganov. Shostakovich was enthusiastic about the idea and expressed his desire to play the piano part with the Quartet himself. The premiere was a triumph for the composer, notwithstanding critical comments from composer colleagues such as Sergei Prokofiev: If Shostakovich were 60 years old, then the tendency on the part of a wise and experienced man to weigh and consider each note might be a wonderful quality. But right now it shows a serious lack. I regret that there are no great flights of fancy in the work, although I must admit that I find the work as a whole outstanding. In the second movement, a fugue, Shostakovich develops movement structures that use Bach as a model without copying him. His fugue is an independent, new creation. Shostakovich continues in the tradition of Max Reger and creates a movement in no way inferior to comparable ones of Paul Hindemith. Krzysztof Meyer appraises the work thus: Today, several decades after its composition, it belongs not only to the most outstanding works of Shostakovich, but surely also to the most important of its genre in the music of our century. Neither the neoclassicism of the first movement nor the Baroque elements in the Intermezzo are still essential today. What remains is magnificent music - perfect in its classical proportions and very typical of the individual language of its author.

During his studies at the Conservatory from 1919 to 1925 Shostakovich wrote the following works: Scherzo in F-sharp minor for Orchestra, Op. 1; Eight Preludes for Piano, Op. 2; Theme and Variations for Orchestra, Op. 3; Two Fables of Krylov ("Cricket and Ant", "Donkey and Nightingale") for Voice and Orchestra, Op. 4; Three Fantastic Dances for Piano, Op. 5; Suite for Two Pianos, Op. 6; Scherzo in E-flat for Orchestra, Op. 7; Trio for Violin, Cello and Piano, Op. 8; Three Pieces for Cello, Op. 9 and as a graduation thesis the First Symphony, Op. 10, the performances of which at home and abroad soon brought the brilliant eighteen-year-old composer great success.

The Trio No. 1 for Violin, Cello and Piano was com-posed in the autumn of 1923 during Shostakovich's studies at the Petrograd Conservatory. The work was first performed in December of the same year at a student concert.

Its first public performance took place on 20 March 1925 at the Small Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, performed by N. Fedorov, (violin), A. Yegrov (cello) and Lev Oborin (piano). The work was dedicated to Tatiana I. Glivenko, who had made friends with the composer during his stay in Gaspra in Crimea during July and August 1923.

As a result of its changeable character, frequent fluctuations in tempo, key and themes, the work is, despite its sonata form structure, more of a rhapsody. The chromatically descending three-note motif of the cello at the outset forms a kind of "leitmotif" that goes through the entire work like a red thread. After an introduction that goes through different keys, the main theme appears for the first time. At once expressive and energetic, it forms a strong contrast to the second, romance-like, lyric-melodic theme. In an extended development section, the two themes alternate in close succession with each other and with a number of theme-related motifs. After the two themes reappear in their complete form in the recapitulation, a triumphant coda brings the movement to a close.

In Russian music of the twentieth century, the custom of dedicating a piano trio to a deceased friend became established. No less a personage than Peter I. Tchaikovsky began this tradition when he wrote a piano trio in memory of Nikolai Rubinstein. Many years later Sergei Rachmaninov wrote a trio in memory of Tchaikovsky. Anton Arensky by turns dedicated a trio to the memory of the late cellist, Karl Davidov. Shostakovich followed in this tradition and composed his Piano Trio No. 2, Op. 67 in 1944 in memory of Ivan Sollertinsky. It reveals parallels to the Eighth Symphony, which was written at the same time. The work was completed in August 1944. David Oistrakh, Sviatoslav Knushevitsky and Lev Oborin immediately expressed their wish to premiere it. Shostakovich refused, for this work had been reserved for the musicians of the Beethoven Quartet. On 14 November 1944 Dmitri Zyganov, Vassily Shirinsky and the composer performed the work in the recently liberated city of Leningrad. The concert was repeated two weeks later in Moscow.

Shostakovich's gigantic oeuvre is incomparably full of contrasts, containing not only complex, sometimes programmatic symphonies or string quartets reflecting the tragedy of Soviet history, but also popular Gebrauchsmusik beside these. The quality of this entertainment music is, however, so high that one finds evidence of master craftsmanship even in the smallest of genres. The composer was able to collect a storehouse of practical experience as a silent movie piano accompanist that he later put to use in his ballets, incidental music and instrumental music as well as in film music. The so-called "Second Waltz" from the Second Jazz Suite has remained a genuine classic hit, being performed these days by the violinist André Rieu throughout the world. The Five Pieces for 2 Violins and Piano taken from ballet suites and film scores of Shostakovich in an arrangement by Levon Atovmian have been published in a printed edition by Sikorski. A Prelude from the film music "Hornets", Op. 97 and a Gavotte from the Ballet Suite No. 3, originally used in the incidental music to "A Human Comedy" in the 1930's are included, among other pieces. Shostakovich's ballet music "Bright Stream" is surely less well known; an Elegy and a Polka taken from it also appear in this volume. Finally, one more waltz is included in this sequence of dance music, a waltz from the cartoon version of "The Tale of Popen and his Servant Balda, Op. 36. With the exception of the Prelude, most of the pieces in this volume were written during the 1930's, an exceptionally creative phase in the life of the composer.

The Viola Sonata, Op. 147 is Shostakovich's last composition. He finished reading the proofs for the printed edition five days before his death. According to the composer's own statement, the final movement of the sonata is dedicated "to the memory of the great Beethoven". He uses a paraphrase of the first movement of the "Moonlight Sonata" in this movement. Besides this we find, as in many works of the composer's final years, self- quotations. He quotes the initial theme of the first movement of the Fourteenth Symphony in the third movement. At the beginning of the second movement thematic material from the unfinished opera "The Gamblers" (to a text by Gogol) appears. The work was dedicated to Fyodor Drushinin, violist of the Beethoven Quartet, who had Shostakovich's quartets firmly in his repertoire during the composer's lifetime. It was not granted the composer to hear this final work. Friends of the composer organized a memorial concert on 25 September 1975, the 69th birthday of Shostakovich, at which the Viola Sonata was posthumously premiered. The violist Vladimir Mendelssohn later arranged the sonata for chamber ensemble.

Like most of Shostakovich's late works, the Viola Sonata reduces virtuosity to a minimum and has a slow movement as its emotional centre. In the dramatically agitated first movement, Moderato, passionate outbursts alternate with dry pizzicato chords. The nervous dialogue darkens toward the end of the movement.

The second movement, Allegretto, has a scherzo character. But tense restlessness lies beneath the dance-like festive surface. The concluding Adagio, in which the slow movement of Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" is weaved in as an echo of this much revered work, develops into a peacefully flowing, yet passionate stream of sound, spreading feelings of farewell and death.
(Claudio Danuser in "Basel Concertino", 9 January 1998)

Printed editions of selected chamber works of Dmitri Shostakovich

Ed. 2159 Sonata for Violin and Piano, Op. 134
Ed. 2323 19 Preludes from Op. 34 for Violin and Piano (Zyganov)
Ed. 2157 Sonata for Cello and Piano, Op. 40
Ed. 2275 Quintet for 2 Violins, Viola, Cello and Piano, Op. 57
Ed. 2270 Prelude and Scherzo Op. 1 for String Octet (4 Vln., 2 Vla., 2 Vc.)
Ed. 2337 Trio No. 1 in C minor, Op. 8 for Violin, Cello and Piano
Ed. 2211 Trio No. 2 in E minor, Op. 67 for Violin, Cello and Piano
Ed. 2216 Five Pieces (Prelude, Gavotte, Elegy, Waltz and Polka) for 2 Violins and Piano (Atovmian)
Ed. 2333 Four Waltzes for Flute, Clarinet and Piano (Atovmian)



The Ballets

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The ballet, jazz and film music suites, and individual numbers from them, such as the famous Second Waltz from the Second Jazz Suite or the Romance from the film music "Hornets" have become genuine hits. They have long since crossed over the border into the realm of popular music and are played in countless versions, arrangements and instrumentations.

The fact that many of the well-known waltzes, gallops and polkas come from Shostakovich's ballets should not lead to the false conclusion that the composer's handling of his material in this genre was less profound than elsewhere. These are mostly excellent compositions, ironical sidelong glances, written in the handwriting of a master. When Shostakovich was com- missioned in 1934 by the Malegot Theatre to write music for the ballet, Bright Stream, it took a certain amount of persuasion, as Meyer remarks in his Shostakovich biography, to convince Shostakovich to set such a banal, propagandistic libretto to music. The piece takes place on a collective farm in Cuba, where a student of agriculture lives with his wife. Everything is idyllic - the way of life, the farm festivitiess - until the point where a group of artists from the capital turn up. The student immediately falls in love with a dancer and arranges a rendezvous. From this point on, the story shares the plot of Mozart's comedy of errors "Cosí fan tutte", in that the abandoned wife slips into the dancer's clothes and confronts the suitor as the dancer's double. The story ends happily with the confusion clearing up. Shostakovich described his music to "Bright Stream" as happy and playful, but also well suited to dancing.

Years before this work, the far more interesting ballets The Golden Age (1939) and Bolt had been written.

The Ballet Suites No. 1 (1949), No. 2 (1951), No. 3 (1952) and No. 4 (1953), later assembled by the composer's friend Lev Atovmian, as well as the Ballet Suite No. 5 (1931), withdrawn by Shostakovich, contain a wealth of titles coming from a wide variety of sources, such as film music, ballets and other disparate orchestral and chamber compositions.

Piano reductions of Shostakovich's ballets

Ed. 2242 String Quartet No. 1 op. 49
Ed. 6883 The Golden Age, Ballet in 3 Acts, Op. 22
Ed. 6884 Bolt, Ballet in 3 Acts, Op. 27
Ed. 6889 Bright Stream, Ballet in 3 Acts, Op. 39



An Operetta by Dmitri Shostakovich

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After the German edition of the BBC Music Magazine, complete with excerpts on an enclosed CD of an adapted version, drew attention to and aroused curiosity about the operetta, Moscow, Cheryomushky some three years ago, Chandos has now come out with a complete recording of the operetta. This first truly worthy recording of a work full of surprises is in the best of hands: Gennadi Rozhdestvensky conducts the Russian State Ensemble, Valeri Polyansky the Residential Orchestra of The Hague.

Detlef Gojowy, musicologist, journalist and proven authority on Shostakovich, writes the following about this recording: Shostakovich never disdained the entertaining course; it is also immanent in his most tragic music. After the rude ban on his "Lady" in 1936 he never continued the line of his cheerful ballets, but to a certain extent he did so in 1959 in his only operetta. The title refers to a Moscow housing project, an object of socialist prestige, and the plot is anything but harmless: it deals with a full-fledged corruption scandal in the idyllic Soviet society, but ends happily. The landlords are denied the keys to the new apartments because one of the powers-that-be wants to cheat them, but are lifted onto the balcony by a helpful crane operator. Whoever might think that the "Kommunalka", the communal apartment shared by several families, is a satirical idea from the 1920's, has another thing coming. They still exist, and having one's own apartment is still the symbol of success and happiness for Russians today.

Shostakovich learned a great deal of his folkloristic craftsmanship from his much-admired Jacques Offenbach, whom he would mention in the same breath with Bach, much to the dismay of his contemporaries, and whose language he emulated even in his method of prosody. There are lofty stylistic quotations in the Tchaikovsky or Beethoven manner, but also many self- quotations from the jolly 1930's and of popular hits of that time. But the dominant material is the slender melody in pleasant dance forms, almost like an 18th century pastoral. In between, the extended spoken scenes are worth hearing for their own sake: Russian comic dialogue can and should sound as entertaining as it does on this CD with the Russian State Ensemble and the Residential Orchestra. It is to be recommended not only to the Shostakovich fan, but also for general instruction in Russian.
(Chandos CHAN 9591-2)





A "Scandalous Opera" (?):
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk

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Shostakovich composed the opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, after the short story of the same name by Nikolai Leskov, between 1939 and 1932. As with his first opera, "The Nose", Shostakovich himself wrote the libretto in collaboration with the writer and dramatic advisor Alexander Preis. It is the story of the salesman's wife Katerina Izmailova, who attempts to break out of the confines of her unhappy marriage and of the narrow society of 19th century tsarist Russia. In so doing, she becomes the lover of the salesman's apprentice Sergei and, in order to live out this supposed "true love", murders her husband and father-in-law. On the way to prison camp, she kills Sergei's new lover and finally herself in desperation.

Due to the radically expressive subject matter of text and music, which hardly corresponded to the "socialistic realism" propagated by those in power, "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk was immediately the object of vicious censorial and editorial attacks following its first performances in Leningrad and Moscow. Thus the first printed editions of 1935, which made the opera known abroad (productions took place in Cleveland, New York, Philadelphia, Stockholm, Buenos Aires, Zurich, Prague, Ljubjana, London, Copenhagen, Zagreb and Bratislava) reveal significant deviations from the original version of 1932. In 1936 the famous article "Chaos Instead of Music" appeared in "Pravda", primarily attacking this opera and ultimately leading to a ban on its performance in the Soviet Union. This ban was only lifted 27 years later, in 1963, after Shostakovich had revised the opera and presented it in a smoother, more harmless version as "Katerina Izmailova". This version of the opera soon established itself in the repertoire of Soviet and many foreign opera companies.

The little-known original 1932 version of "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk" was not published until 1979, when Sikorski undertook the task. At the same time Mstislav Rostropovich made a recording of it now available on CD from EMI. After the world premiere of the German version by Jörg Morgener and Siegfried Schoenbohm in Wuppertal, the opera received international acclaim and today counts among the greatest musical dramatic works of the 20th century. "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk has now been produced on some four dozen opera stages.

PRINTED EDITIONS

Ed. 2313 Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk
Piano Reduction
Ed. 2320 Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk
German Text: Jörg Morgener and Siegfried Schoenbohm
Libretto



Yiddish Folk Poetry and the Thirteenth Symphony:
Aspects of Shostakovich's Artistic Work

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As is well known, anti-Semitism has a long history in Russia. At several points during his life, in certain works respectively, Shostakovich confronted this subject directly and critically. But even without taking the political situation into account, he was close to Jewish culture. It inspired him and continually influenced his work anew, playing a particularly significant role in the later works.

Soviet Anti-Semitism was especially prevalent during the Stalin era following the Second World War. In those days there were vehement quarrels between advocates of opposing artistic persuasions in the committees of the Communist Party. In the course of these quarrels Shostakovich came to feel directly the strictures set by the regime. He did not dare, for example, to publish the vocal cycle From Yiddish Folk Poetry, Op. 79a, written three years after the end of the war, or the First Violin Concerto, Op. 77. The Yiddish folk songs are partially intended as a protest against the prevalent anti-Semitism and contain an unspoken memorial to many Jewish friends during the war. The critics, so thought Shostakovich at the time, would have roundly condemned the songs.

Krzysztof Meyer writes in his comprehensive Shostakovich biography with regard to the songs of Jewish folk poetry: It became perfectly clear what fears the people during the Stalin period had. Fear of the neigh-bours, fear of one's own family, of foreigners, of everyone - ... it required much courage to write such a work. It was not performed until seven years after its composition.



Printed Edition: 2346
"From Yiddish Folk Poetry"

Song Cycle for Soprano, Alto, Tenor and Piano, Op. 79a

With his pronouncement "to enemies of the Jews I am like a Jew", Dmitri Shostakovich underlined demonstratively and unmistakably his solidarity with the oppressed Jews of the Soviet Union. There is a Jewish element in many of his compositions (especially in the song cycle "From Yiddish Folk Poetry", Op. 79a, in the Second Piano Trio, Op 67 or in the F- sharp minor Prelude from the 24 Preludes and Fugues for Piano) that is not to be overheard; to Shostakovich, this was, as Hans-Klaus Jungheinrich so aptly formulated ("Musica", January/February 1995): ... something of a code of inner resistance against the ordained consensus, comparable to the stubborn D-S-C-H- motif of self-assertion, with which the composer, frequently forced into conformity for his very survival, managed to proclaim his independence and freedom (as in the Tenth Symphony and the Eighth Quartet) against the despotic affronts of collective cries of jubilation.

It would seem that we owe the settings of the Jewish songs to a chance occurrence. Shostakovich apparently discovered these songs in a 1947 volume of poetry edited by J. Dobrushyn and A. Yunitsky in a bookshop and was deeply moved by their poetry on the spot, according to the official Soviet version. However, Detlef Gojowy has revealed that Shostakovich knew the Jewish songs much earlier, through his friendship with the director of the Jewish Theatre, Solomon Michoels. The collection contains poems translated into Russian from the original Yiddish. Shostakovich set five of them for solo voice with piano accompani- ment, four as duets and two as trios. Krzysztof Meyer counts this cycle amongst Shostakovich's most wonderful and at the same time most personal works, even if individual parts differ from one another in their artistic value. The first eight songs of 1948 deal with scenes from the lives of a poor Jewish family, in the manner of a genre-picture. They orientate themselves towards the musical language of Modest Mussorgsky and sound a markedly tragic note. The three songs composed two months later, on the other hand, concern themselves with banal and illustrative aspects. Why Shostakovich tolerated this gap, or even created it on purpose, is unclear to the present day. One thing is certain: that at the time of its belated premiere seven years afterwards in 1955, anti-Semitic sentiment in Russia was high.

Even before the premiere Shostakovich received threatening and mocking letters (e.g. you have sold yourself to the Jews!). Already in 1948, during Shostakovich's 42nd birthday celebrations, the first eight songs had been performed. Sviatoslav Richter played the piano part. Shostakovich completed the work in October 1948. Already in November the Jewish Anti- Fascist League was prohibited, and before the year was out Stalin began his campaign against Jewish intellectuals. The political climate had changed so rapidly that Shostakovich hesitated to present the eleven songs to the Central Committee of the Communist Party. Only two years after Stalin's death was the cycle performed in its entirety, a very important event for the composer in light of the personal attacks he had suffered. Shostakovich himself played piano, Nina Dorliak, Sarah Dolukhanova and Alexei Maslennikov were the singers. During the same year the composer made an orchestrated version of the cycle.

Solomon Volkov quotes Shostakovich in his memoirs, published in 1979: Too many people disappeared, and no one knew where. And no one knows where they are buried. Not even their closest relations know. That is what happened to many of my friends. Where can we erect a monument for Meyerhold ...? That can only be done with music. I am prepared to dedicate a piece of music to each one of the victims. Unfortunately, this is impossible; I will therefore dedicate my complete works to them.

Printed Edition: Ed. 2244
String Quartet No. 4, Op. 83


The Fourth String Quartet, Op. 83 begins in the manner of a simple folk song. The violin parts embrace each other in endless figurations above a long pedal point in the viola and cello. Chorale-like inserts interrupt this texture. The romance-like Andantino is equally unpretentious, with a theme that dissolves into triadic figurations above peaceful chords at the end. A "cadence of mourning" leads us into this conclusion.

In the scherzo-like third movement we encounter a muted, pulsing bustle, taking the form of a gallop by the time we reach the middle section. After a connecting recitative in the viola leads us into the final movement, the first violin begins a theme that bears unmistakable witness to Shostakovich's love for a kind of music that inspired him as no other did: Jewish folk music. In the individual movements, as in the work as a whole, one notices an avoidance of contrasts. Even the tempo indications of the movements match each other: three Allegrettos and one Andantino. A reserved, mournful tone permeates the entire work, standing in a peculiar relationship to the radiance of the basic D major tonality. The duality of the statement is further emphasized by a theme in the final movement evocative of Jewish folk music. Shostakovich once described it as a type of music with two levels of perception, apparently happy on the surface but with a deeper level of tragedy underneath.

Printed Edition: Ed. 2207
Symphony No. 13 in B-flat minor, Op. 113

for Bass, Men's Choir and Orchestra Based on Poems by Yevgeny Yevtushenko (Russian/German) Study Score


Every now and then Shostakovich returned to Jewish models, influences and traditions. Four years after the premiere performance of the song cycle "From Yiddish Folk Poetry" in 1955 he began work on the Thirteenth Symphony, Op. 113. This works sets the poem "Babi Yar" by Yevgeny Yevtushenko, a poem mourning the murder of Jews in a Ukrainian camp during the war. The Soviet authorities were not slow to react with sharp attacks.

The criticism of the Thirteenth Symphony, significantly coming from the conservative political camp, was very shabby. They used the pretext that Shostakovich had treated the subject too one-sidedly, whatever that may be taken to mean. Yevtushenko, according to Krzysztof Meyer, was accused of lacking patriotism, because he had portrayed the drama of the Jews without mentioning victims of other nationalities who had also been murdered in Babi Yar, the terror-filled gulch near Kiev. Shostakovich had already finished the first movement before requesting the poet's permission to set his text; he had not initially wished to use this subject matter in a symphony. He reported: At first I wrote something along the lines of a vocal-instrumental setting of Yevtushenko's text "Babi Yar". Only later did I think of continuing the work and bringing in other texts by this poet. The second movement is based on the poem "Humour", the third on "In the Shop". Yevtushenko wrote the poem "Anxieties", on which the fourth movement is based, especially for me in connection with this new work. For the finale I chose the poem "Career" ... The poems were published at different times and deal with different problems. I wanted to connect them through music. Thus I wrote a symphony rather than a series of individual tone pictures.

Shostakovich worked with the poetry of Yevgeny Yevtushenko one more time after writing the Thirteenth Symphony when he decided to dedicate a cantata for bass voice and orchestra to the fate of Stepan Razin.


The One-Act Opera "Rothschild's Violin"
by Benjamin Fleishman / Dmitri Shostakovich


The one-act opera "Rothschild's Violin" is based on the short story of the same title by Anton Chekov and is set in a provincial Russian city towards the end of the 19th century. The coffin maker Ivanov, called "Bronze", is a violinist in a small Jewish orchestra in his home city that regularly plays at weddings and funerals. At one celebration "Bronze" gets into a fight with the flautist Rothschild, whom he accuses of always turning the happiest of melodies into a sad one. The coffin maker runs away and begins to reflect upon life. As a coffin maker, he has a vested interest in people dying. But when his wife Marfa dies, he is much shaken. A deep change of attitude takes hold of him. In a long monologue he reflects how quickly and pointlessly life flies by. If only there weren't so much hate and ill will, all people could live together happily. Led by this insight, he presents Rothschild, whom he had only criticized and humiliated up until this time, with his violin as a token of reconciliation, then lies down to die. Rothschild begins to play one of his sad melodies.



Shostakovich, who felt a deep affinity to Chekov's works, expressed the desire to write more music based on this writer's subjects. This wish never found fulfilment in the form of a stage work. Nonetheless the Fifteenth Symphony is closely related to motifs from Chekov's literary works, referring indirectly and rather varyingly to Chekov's "The Black Monk". Shostakovich: I have not yet learned to apply Chekov's most important maxim: For him all people are equal. He shows them, and reader must decide for himself what is good and what is evil.

How it came to pass that Shostakovich completed the work of his pupil Benjamin Fleishman, we can learn from the composer himself: My student Benjamin Fleishman wrote an opera based on Chekov's "Rothschild's Violin". I suggested he do an opera on the subject. Fleishman was a sensitive spirit and he had a fine rapport with Chekov. But he had a hard life. Fleishman had a tendency to write sad music rather than happy music, and naturally he was abused for it. Fleishman sketched out the opera, but then volunteered for the army. He was killed. He went into the People's Volunteer Guard. They were barely trained and poorly armed, and thrown into the most dangerous areas. They were all candidates for corpsehood (...) I'm happy that I managed to complete "Rothschild's Violin" for Fleishman and orchestrate it. It's a marvellous opera - sensitive and sad. There are no cheap effects in it, it is wise and very Chekovian.

The sensitivity and sadness that Shostakovich was quick to recognize in Fleishman's opera must be somewhat qualified. The music is also highly dramatic and gripping; there are shrill instrumental passages that remind one at times of "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk" and vocal parts (especially those for solo bass and tenor) that take their cue from Mussorgsky and early Shosta- kovich ("The Nose" and the unfinished opera "The Gamblers").

"Rothschild's Violin" was first performed in 1968 in Leningrad under the direction of Maxim Shostakovich on the occasion of the grand opening of the "Experimental Studio for Chamber Opera". The work was already banned on the very next day, so that it could not be used as a "tool of Zionist propaganda".


Rarely Performed Works
of Dmitri Shostakovich
- A Selection -

contents

The Carillon of Novorossisk
no opus number, for Orchestra

World Premiere on 27 September 1960 by the Great Soviet Radio Symphony Orchestra


This brief orchestral work was commissioned by the Municipal Authorities of Novorossisk and recorded by the Great Soviet Radio Symphony Orchestra. The tape of the music was then installed in the clock tower that stands on the Square of the Heroes Before the Flame of Eternal Renown. The music sounds every hour on the hour. The inhabitants of Novorossisk heard it for the first time on 27 September 1960.

Overture on Russian and Kirghiz Themes
Op. 115 for Orchestra

World Premiere on 10 October 1963 by the State Symphony Orchestra of the USSR


Shostakovich composed this overture in honour of the one hundredth anniversary of the voluntary union of the Kirghiz with Russia. The world premiere took place on 10 October 1963 in Moscow with the State Symphony Orchestra of the USSR.

Symphonic Poem "October"
in C minor for Orchestra

World Premiere on 26 October 1967 in Moscow by the Moscow Philharmonic


The Seven Romances to texts by Alexander Blok as well as the Second Violin Concerto were written during the period in which the entire nation was celebrating the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution. It was obvious that neither the Seven Romances nor the Second Violin Concerto was suited to such a jubilee. On the other hand, it was expected of Shostakovich that he compose a special work in honour of this event. Finally, Shostakovich obliged: he composed a twelve-minute overture entitled "October" (Meyer, ibid, p. 483).

Two Arrangements of Russian Folk Songs
Op. 104 for a cappella Choir

World Premiere on 24 November 1957 by the State Academic Choir of the USSR


I. The Winds Blew
II. How My Husband Painfully Beat Me, A Young Woman


Four Poems of Captain Lebyadkin
Op. 146 for Bass and Piano
to texts of Fyodor Dostoievsky

World Premiere on 10 May 1975 in Moscow by J. Nesterenko and J. Shenderovich


The poems relate to the novel "The Possessed" of Fyodor Dostoievsky. Captain Lebyadkin is a self-taught poet who lets himself be persuaded to write verses as the result of a bet. His declaration of love in the first poem is an almost bitter satire on his war injury and his unbridled joy at the realization that his adored one has just suffered a riding accident, fracturing a leg. The "Charity Ball for Governesses" seems rather socially critical without actually revealing the author's own position on the subject. The closing poem "A Brilliant Personality" is a revolutionary call for freedom, equality and fraternity.


Anti Formalistic Rayok
no opus number, for Soloists, mixed Choir and Piano

World Premiere on 12 January 1989 in Washington (Russian/German/English) by J. Deutsch, E. Halfvarson, J. Rodescu, A. Wentzel and Members of the Choral Arts Society of Washington



The immediate reason for the composition of Anti-Formalist Rayok was the "advice" of composers in the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union that took place in January 1948, the resolution of the Central Committee of February 1948 concerning the opera "The Great Friendship" by V. Muradeli and the Second All Union Congress of Soviet Composers (1957). Shostakovich, who wrote both the text and the music of this satirical work, lets us observe a fictive assembly in which representatives of Socialist Realism denounce so-called formalistic composers. The cheerfully ironical cantata leaves us in no doubt as to which side Shostakovich's sympathies are on.

The first public performance (in the incomplete version without the final scene) took place on 12 January 1989 in Washington, D.C., at the Kennedy Centre Concert Hall, in English. Mstislav Rostropovich directed from the piano. The soloists were Jonathan Deutsch, Eric Halfvarson, Julian Rodescu and Andrew Wentzel (all basses), with members of the Choral Arts Society of Washington.

Afterwards, the same musicians recorded this version on CD (Erato ECD 75571). On the same CD is a Russian language recording of the work with Nikola Ghiuselev, Nikita Storoyev, Romuald Tesarowicz, Arcadi Volodos and the Ensemble Audite Nova under the direction of Mstislav Rostropovich.

The premiere performance of the complete and definitive version took place at a concert celebrating Shostakovich's 83rd birthday on 25 September 1989 in the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory under the direction of Valeri Polyansky. The other performers were Dmitri Dorliak (reader) and Igor Chudolei (piano), together with members of the State Chamber Choir of the Cultural Ministry of the USSR.

The performance of this work requires four bass soloists and mixed choir. The number of performers can, however, be reduced to one bass. This bass "artist" must be able to transform himself accordingly so that he can sing all four roles. The choir of the music functionaries can be dispensed with.


Two Pieces for String Quartet, Op. 36
For the Jean Vuillaume Quartet
World Premiere in 1984 by the Borodin Quartet


It became known only recently that Shostakovich had already made his first attempt at string quartet composition in 1931, seven years before the First String Quartet, with these Two Pieces. The first performance in the USSR by the Borodin Quartet in the spring of 1984 was followed up within a year by the first per-formance in the West by the same ensemble in Duisburg during the international Shostakovich Festival 1984/85.

The Two Pieces, written on 1 November 1931 for the Jean Vuillaume Quartet, are arrangements of two works that were of great significance to the 25-year-old composer at the time. One is taken from the opera "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk", which Shostakovich was working on; this "Elegy" is a transcription of a highly dramatic aria from the third scene, in which Katerina Izmailova openly laments her lack of sensual fulfilment. The musical substance of the original has been transferred to the quartet medium almost literally; the only substantial changes are the intensification of the big crescendo starting at bar 34 by syncopations in the cello part and an eight-bar conclusion, with its chain of chords in quavers and a concluding formula in the second violin.

The ensuing "Polka" is a transcription of the famous polka from the satirical ballet "The Golden Age" for string quartet. This ballet had been premiered on 26 October 1930 in Leningrad, and two numbers from it, the "Tahiti Trot" and the "Polka", with its saucy, disso- nant xylophone solo, immediately won the hearts of the Russian public.


The Execution of Stepan Razin, Op. 119
Poem for Bass Solo, Men's Choir and Orchestra

to a text by Yevgeny Yevtushenko (Russian/German)
World Premiere on 28 December 1964 by the Moscow Philharmonic, V. Gromadsky, Bass, Conducted by K. Kondrashin


Stepan Razin, the leader of a national uprising on the Don and the lower Volga, executed in 1671, became a favoured topic for many artists, writers and composers in Russia and in the Soviet Union. After all, Stepan (Styenka) Razin was hailed as a protector of the enslaved and oppressed and was idolized after his death as a popular hero. Naturally, a political motive was not infrequently hidden behind the interest in this subject - a motive especially apparent during the period of the Soviet regime. The divided Russian empire of that time regarded the highly dangerous Cossack uprising under Captain Razin, as well as his invasions and conquests of southern Russia and the Ukraine, as events bearing symbolic character. As in the saga of the North Sea pirate Störtebeker, who hurried through the ranks of his comrades while headless, so it was with Razin, who remained alive after his execution, and, in the memories of the oppressed, will forever remain so. As the poet concludes:

A parson hurried trembling towards the skeleton,
He wanted to close Styenka's pale eyelids.
But, tense as wild beasts before the attack
Styenka's eyes frightened off his hand.
This gaze of devil's eyes full of hate
Caused even the Tsars to shudder and become deathly pale.
His victory over the ruler loudly proclaimed
To the world, broke out in laughter from his head.


Dmitri Shostakovich composed his vocal-symphonic poem on Stepan Razin in 1964 to a text by Yevgeny Yevtushenko. The world premiere took place on 28 December of that year at the Moscow Conservatory. Shortly after the premiere the work was awarded a prize from the Russian Composers' Union and in 1968 even won the Russian State Prize. The work is, however, regardless of its political motivation, closely related to the Thirteenth Symphony of 1962, in which the composer used other texts by Yevtushenko ("Babi Yar", "The Joke", "In the Shop", "Anxieties", and "Career"). The picturesque language of the rather younger Russian writer - Yevtushenko was born in 1933 in Siberia - and his poems, which had gained such wide popularity during the post-Stalin era, fascinated Shostakovich no end; they revealed striking parallels to his own suggestive musical language. As in the Thirteenth Symphony, Shostakovich here uses an enormous orchestral apparatus, in which the mixed choir is effectively pitted against the bass solo. The insistent ostinati and the accusingly repetitive fortissimo blocks lead the easily followed events back to elementary statements. The Thirteenth Symphony and the Razin Cantata count amongst the most expressive and powerful scores of Shostakovich's late period. Even at the West German premiere in early 1969 in Gelsenkirchen, at which a negative critical reception had been expected due to the distant relationship between Germany and the Soviet Union at that time, the work was praised by the press. It was considered a fascinating work, in the words of the Recklinghauser Zeitung "unmistakable, typical Shostakovich". The composer's language reveals itself ever more sharply defined, clear-cut, unequivocal. In no way does he shrink from monumentality in the orchestral parts, while the "inner tensions" are at times written out to the point of anguish.

Shortly after the premiere, the Russian musicologist wrote in the periodical "Muskalnaya Shisn" (No. 19, 1967):

The structure of this symphonic poem for soloist, choir and orchestra is unusual in that it is not characterized by inherent musical laws, but by the stratum of content provided by the verses of Yevgeny Yevtushenko, on which the work is based. It is remarkable that the composer treats the text of this symphonic poem like an opera libretto. The influence of the operas of Modest Mussorgsky is readily perceptible in the crowd scenes. A varied, musical/painterly tone picture enfolds before us ... The musical language of "The Execution of Stepan Razin" stands out by its truly many-sided connection to the Russian folk song. One senses echoes of the farcical refrains that correspondingly assume the character of a grotesque that has reached a critical point. There are clearly influences from thieves' songs present (Styenka's "Aria"), as well as from sagas, tales and the portrayals of character types (civil servant, hangman, maiden, money changer, salesmen's wives, etc.) ... The fact of the execution is strikingly simple. The varied polyphonic dramaturgy so characteristic of the composer is hardly used here. The simplicity leads to a dramaturgy of the unison here and there, of a kind all its own, in which the orchestral part is scored and structured in a highly differentiated manner.

Concerning the composition of "The Execution of Stepan Razin", it is interesting to note that there were significant discrepancies between the first draft of the piano score, written in 1964 at Lake Balaton, Hun-gary, and the final score. These caused the premiere performance to be postponed. The conductor of the premiere, Kyrill Kontrashin, reminisces in his memoirs:

The rehearsals were rather chaotic. The invited soloist, Ivan Petrov, bass at the Bolshoi Theatre, had learned his part quickly, but he came to the rehearsals unwillingly and invented one excuse or another for not showing up. Vitali Gromadsky was the substitute singer. On the day of the concert, Petrov did not come to the dress rehearsal; he rang up, saying that he would not sing at the concert that evening. Shostakovich jumped up, and when I asked for his advice, he replied:

"Of course the singer who comes to the dress rehearsal will sing at the performance." ... When I offered: "For heaven's sake, don't listen to those who think we should dispense with the performance" (for pressure was being applied in this direction), he categorically responded: "The performance will only be postponed if there is no one there to sing."



Six Romances to Poems
of Raleigh, Burns and Shakespeare

Version for Bass and Piano, Op. 62
Version for Bass and Orchestra, Op. 140
World Premiere on 30 November 1973 by Y. Nesterenko



Shostakovich composed the Six Romances for Bass and Piano, Op. 62 in 1942. Each song is dedicated to a person from whom the composer was separated during the war, with the exception of the dedication to his wife, Nina. The orchestral version (Op. 140) was completed three decades later. The instrumentation, melodic style and the visions of death are related to the 14th and 15th Symphonies and to the late quartets. The cycle opens with a powerful setting of Raleigh's sonnet "To the Son". Burns's love poem "Oh, If You Stood On That Height" inspired Shostakovich to write a remarkably simple setting, seeming to hide an extremely emotional content behind a deep secrecy. He describes a love that defies even the toughest of circumstances. Shostakovich wrote the following about the song "McPherson's Farewell" in his memoirs: Zoshchenko (1895-1958, writer of satirical short stories, in which made un- favourable comments on Soviet daily life in an inimitable way) tried a materialistic approach to the issue of death. He thought that if he wrote about death ironically, he would stop fearing it. For a while I was in complete agreement with Zoshchenko. I even wrote a composition on the theme - "McPherson before Execution", based on a poem by Robert Burns. The bittersweet song "Jenny" (based on Burns) follows. This composition evokes an almost clandestine melodic line through repetitive phrases as well as an extremely delicate accompaniment of the sensitivity and vulnerability of a young girl. The melodically flowing Sonnet LXVI of Shakespeare, "Tired with All These", almost entirely built upon a pedal point, is dedicated to Shostakovich's friend, the musicologist Ivan Sollertinsky. The final song, "The King's Campaign", an English children's poem, expresses boundless despair. Shostakovich uses the full sound of the orchestra only here. The martial staccato of single instruments emphatically conjures up the image of a military band.


Six Poems of Marina Tsvetayeva
Version for Alto and Piano, Op. 143
Version for Alto and Orchestra, Op. 143a
World Premiere on 6 June 1974 in Moscow


Marina Tsvetayeva, who described herself as being "condemned to poetry-writing the way a wolf is to howling," was born in Moscow in 1892 and published her first collection of poems in 1910. Having a hostile attitude towards the revolution, she was granted permission to emigrate in 1922; during the next seventeen years in Prague, and later in Paris, she continued to write under conditions of utmost personal and financial difficulties. In 1939 she returned to Russia. One can be quite certain of one thing: there as well, I shall belong to the persecuted, not to the persecutors, to the victims, not the executioners. Back in Russia, she was forced by new hardships to commit suicide in 1941. In life as in art, her friend Boris Pasternak wrote, she had a fierce, zealous, almost rapacious need for definition and finality; in the fulfilment of this she outdid herself. A selection of her poems was not published in the Soviet Union until 1961. Shostakovich set six of her poems in 1973 for alto and piano and made a version for alto and chamber orchestra one year before his death. The orchestra is used with a masterly sense of expediency and variety; each individual song is orchestrated differently.

Like so many of Shostakovich's late works, especially the Fourteenth Symphony to which it is related in some respects, this Tsvetayeva cycle inhabits a very private world of feelings and gestures far removed from those of the composer's contemporaries, especially those in the West. Fiercely appropriate expressions of mockery, defiance, pride, bitterness, loneliness, longing and shy tenderness follow one another with startling gruffness, and the emotional complexity of these six songs stands in inverse proportion to the simplicity and reserve of the musical means used to achieve it.




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