Essential Shostakovich Discs

[Beef Oven!]

Another Russian Conductor who hasn't gotten mentioned much here is Barshai. I have his Brilliant Symphony set as a download on my phone. They have all been pretty satisfying without any single one obscuring alternative versions. I don't much care for Barshai's arrangements of the Quartets but some people really like them.

I’ve had the CD box-set since it was first released on Brilliant Classics more than 10 years ago - and I agree with you. Also agree about the quartet arrangements.

[Petrushka]

Many Russian recordings have become rather expensive - I quite fancy the Kondrashin set but at £243 ....
I remember an excellent EMI Melodiya ASD 2420 - Svetlanov conducting Sym 10.

I bought that Svetlanov LP of the 10th in August 1975, in the very week that Shostakovich died. Someone on the Forum (forget who sorry, Highland Dougie?) alerted us to a download from HMV of all places and I duly bought it.

And here it is: https://www.hmvdigital.com/releases/3573870

[cloughie]

I’ve had the CD box-set since it was first released on Brilliant Classics more than 10 years ago - and I agree with you. Also agree about the quartet arrangements.

A bargain buy from Superdrug - shame they don't do CDs anymore!

[Beef Oven!]

A bargain buy from Superdrug - shame they don't do CDs anymore!

Yes, I’d heard about Superdrug, but I never bought any CDs in there.

[Dave2002]

I bought that Svetlanov LP of the 10th in August 1975, in the very week that Shostakovich died. Someone on the Forum (forget who sorry, Highland Dougie?) alerted us to a download from HMV of all places and I duly bought it.

And here it is: https://www.hmvdigital.com/releases/3573870

Interestingly there are couple of Svetlanov versions on Spotify -
https://play.spotify.com/album/6NYzb...tm_medium=open and

and

https://play.spotify.com/album/4tjLIqpXfLWdiKoxpQAEWN?play=true&utm_source=open.spotify.com&utm_medium=open

The first is a 1968 performance from the RAH.

The Melodiya recording is also on Qobuz.

It is certainly worth listening to these - and the sound of the orchestra in at least one version is distinctive. I will listen to these again.

I thought this (the ASD LP version) was the one I heard first, many years ago, and I recall being very impressed. However I'm not so certain now that this stands up so well against the very best recordings and live performances from recent years. There are issues though - one being the subjective nature of critical assessment - and that includes my own. I recall a performance of Shostakovich 10 with Haitink and the VPO in the Barbican years ago - which was almost certainly in 2006 as per this review - http://www.musicweb-international.co...06/vpo1306.htm

The reviewer didn't like Haitink's performance much - but that does not correspond to my own recollection of the Shostakovich piece - which I heard several times over several years. I recall really enjoying that one, and the VPO being well up to playing the piece. A friend and I went to just about every Shostakovich symphony performance until we got saturated a few years ago. I think Haitink has a lot to offer in this work, and listening to his recordings also comfirms this to me.

There are several very good recordings of the 10th. I think the Svetlanov versions are worth hearing, and enjoying, but perhaps they are not "definitive" amongst the currently available competition. However, we shouldn't just stick with one performance all the time, should we? There'd be no point in ever going to concerts again if we found one recording or performance we thought would be "the best"!

[EnemyoftheStoat]

However, we shouldn't just stick with one performance all the time, should we? There'd be no point in ever going to concerts again if we found one recording or performance we thought would be "the best"!

I've been inspired by this thread to listen to some recordings that might not be "essential" or "definitive". Gergiev's Mariinsky 4th is now playing; not my "go-to" version but still very much worth a spin as an alternative to Jansons/BRSO or Barshai/WDR.

[BBMmk2]

I have been thinking about the recordings of Gergiev's interpretations of Shosta's music. Any thoughts? I am rather fond of the 4th & 8th, with the Mariinsky Orchestra?

[Cockney Sparrow]

Svetlanov - always worth investigating IMO. Also available on Naxos Music Library (as are the three B minor Mass from the BaL) . Post #24:
http://www.for3.org/forums/showthrea...116#post604116

[BBMmk2]

I’ve had the CD box-set since it was first released on Brilliant Classics more than 10 years ago - and I agree with you. Also agree about the quartet arrangements.

Absolutely Beefy. Barshai on both counts. A tremendous value for money box set! the playing, Barshai's way with these works is something else as well.

[visualnickmos]

Absolutely Beefy. Barshai on both counts. A tremendous value for money box set! the playing, Barshai's way with these works is something else as well.

Absolutely! Agree 100% The best 99p I've ever spent in a chemist! Superdrug in the Strand.....

[Petrushka]

JLW's pleas on behalf of Rozhdestvensky, Kondrashin etc should not go unheeded. True, you have Soviet era brass and occasionally not the best sonics but what you do have is something utterly priceless: authenticity. Those who go big on 'authenticity' in Bach etc have the real thing when it comes to Shostakovich. Not even today's crop of Russian conductors such as Gergiev and Petrenko can boast this.

I've been very fortunate to have seen most of the conductors who knew Shostakovich perform his music, albeit with Western orchestras, though the only time I saw Kondrashin he performed Rachmaninov and ditto Barshai when he performed Prokofiev. I was present when Maxim Shostakovich gave a concert of his father's music with the LPO just after his defection to the West in 1981 and I went backstage afterwards to meet him.

it is easy to forget now that Shostakovich was hot news in the aftermath of the publication of the Volkov Testimony book and Maxim's defection but all this has receded into history as time marches on.

So, yes, for the truly essential Shostakovich discs you must have Mravinsky, Kondrashin and Rozhdestvensky without question, plus anything by Svetlanov, Rostropovich and Maxim that you can get hold of.

No one has mentioned the complete set that Maxim Shostakovich made with the Prague Symphony Orchestra for Supraphon. Does anyone know it?

[Dave2002]

Svetlanov - always worth investigating IMO. Also available on Naxos Music Library (as are the three B minor Mass from the BaL) . Post #24:
http://www.for3.org/forums/showthrea...116#post604116

Absolutely!

I heard a very good version (performance/radio broadcast?) of Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra by him - probably from his time with Swedish Orchestras. Many of his other recordings are good too, or at the very least worth investigating.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Miaskovsky-Complete-Symphonies-Nos-27/dp/B000XCTD5S/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1487067356&sr=1-1&keywords=svetlanov+myaskovsky+box

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Complete-Symphonies-Glazunov/dp/B003HM3BEA/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1487067385&sr=1-1&keywords=svetlanov+Glazunov+box

The Miaskovsky box in particular is worth checking out. There are other sets or versions of individual Glazunov symphonies which may do as well or better, and perhaps at lower prices if purchases are price sensitive. A considerable proportion of his recorded output has been available in boxes, like the ones listed. I don't know of others which are particularly to be recommended. There doesn't seem to be an "integrale" set of Shostakovich by him.

[kea]

I might be the only person but I really appreciate Teodor Currentzis's recording of the 14th Symphony on Alpha.

Also the best recording of the 13th string quartet I've heard is by the St Petersburg Quartet on Hyperion, I think deleted now though. The Taneyev Quartet's performance of the 9th quartet is also fairly essential. Even harder to find though. Finally, Shostakovich's own recording of the 2nd Piano Trio with members of the Beethoven Quartet is a fairly obvious must-hear despite sounding like it was recorded on a potato. Tempi are very instructive.

[Howdenite]

Many Russian recordings have become rather expensive - I quite fancy the Kondrashin set but at £243 ....
I remember an excellent EMI Melodiya ASD 2420 - Svetlanov conducting Sym 10.

These also seem to be available from Qobuz at £47.99. Very tempting, but I am a bit hesitant to tackle another huge download from them as it means hours of work pulling down and editing metadata...

[Pulcinella]

The discogs site says that Haitink's version of the 14th symphony was the first to use a version (that had the composer's approval) in the original languages (though in back-translation, I read elsewhere, so presumably not the actual original texts).

https://www.discogs.com/Shostakovich-Varády-Fischer-Dieskau-Concertgebouw-Orchestra-Haitink-Symphony-No-14/release/6489742

Can the knowlegeable folk on here tell me if this practice caught on, either in performance or practice?
I'm not aware of any comment about language(s) being made on recordings I've seen (not that I've really looked, it must be said). It seems to me a rather odd thing to do, if the composer set everything in Russian.