BaL 29.06.13 - Shostakovich Symphony. No. 5

[amateur51]

LeMartinPecheur you do Ian MacDonald a disservice - re-writes or no the whole book is dodgy (But then he was a musical amateur, a writer on pop music without an ability to read Russian so what do you expect?) Wherever it comes to discussing the music itself he doesn't seem to realise that the music has a structure and a form, he simply ascribes political meanings to musical "events" out of context. I'm with Shostakovich when he said, “When a critic writes that in such-and-such a symphony Soviet civil servants are represented by the oboe and the clarinet, and Red Army men by the brass section, you want to scream!” Mind you, MacDonald did get one thing right when he described "Testimony" as a "dishonest presentation".

As a "comprehensive demolition of the Fay/Taruskin attacks" Shostakovich Reconsidered doesn't even get to first base. The book doesn't provide anything near to a convincing explanation as to why "Testimony" contains so many pages taken verbatim from articles Shostakovich had already written and had published in the Soviet press.

I think I'm following you here, DavidP - so what book about Shostakovich's life and music would you recommend?

[DavidP]

I think I'm following you here, DavidP - so what book about Shostakovich's life and music would you recommend?

Amsey, you could call it a cop out if I say "read as many of them as you can find and make up your own mind." But seriously I would say this, even Volkov or Mcdonald. Although writing along the lines of "this is what Shostakovich REALLY meant" is tiresome talk about music in terms of how it has been received by the audience can be illuminating. Many Russians, for instance, listened to the music in exactly the way Volkov writes about it and in that sense his two books on the composer ("Testimony" and "Shostakovich v. Stalin") can be useful. Coming off the fence I'd recommend Laurel Fay's "Shostakovich: A Life" (as a strictly factual, if sometimes dull, account of his life) and Elizabeth Wilson's "Shostakovich: A Life Remembered".

[umslopogaas]

There's no end to this debate, I'm sure I've heard it many times. I note that whereas I have just one book on my shelves about most major composers, for DS I have six. I think what you end up believing has a lot to do with your political sympathies. If you lean left, you will see him as a faithful servant of the revolution. If you lean right you will see a victim of an unjust state who encoded a bitter complaint about his treatment in his music. Its worth remembering that whereas his commentators mostly worked from a safe distance from Stalinist tyranny, DS actually had to endure it. I read that at one time he was so sure he was going to be arrested that he kept his suitcase permanently packed. That anyone can produce anything under such conditions is notable, let alone what he managed. If he was sometimes contradictory or inexplicable, try imagining what he had to put up with. I believe he once said "I'll sign anything" and I think in his shoes so would I.

With respect to books, there are essays by Fay and Taruskin and many others in "A Shostakovich Casebook" ed. Malcolm Hanrick Brown. I cant agree with the criticisms of Ian MacDonald: the blurbs on the back include " A considerable tour de force of musical and social analysis" by Norman Lebrecht, who can be a considerable pain in the backside, but undoubtedly is a critic to be heard. Volkov may be controversial, but he is a very good read. "Shostakovich: a life remembered" by Elizabeth Wilson is exhaustive and much to be recommended, in my opinion. "Shostakovich: the man and his music" ed. Christopher Norris is also well worth reading, with essays by some eminent musicians and academics.

[amateur51]

Amsey, you could call it a cop out if I say "read as many of them as you can find and make up your own mind." But seriously I would say this, even Volkov or Mcdonald. Although writing along the lines of "this is what Shostakovich REALLY meant" is tiresome talk about music in terms of how it has been received by the audience can be illuminating. Many Russians, for instance, listened to the music in exactly the way Volkov writes about it and in that sense his two books on the composer ("Testimony" and "Shostakovich v. Stalin") can be useful. Coming off the fence I'd recommend Laurel Fay's "Shostakovich: A Life" (as a strictly factual, if sometimes dull, account of his life) and Elizabeth Wilson's "Shostakovich: A Life Remembered".

Many thanks DavidP

I was very taken by Elizabeth Wilson's contribution to the film broadcast on BBC TV about Rostropovich (was it called Genius of the Cello?)* and I bought her book but I've not read it yet. I''ll remedy that this Summer, I think and then follow on with the Volkovs.

* I was right http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Od7IPKN8_aU

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Part of the problem is that Shosty told a different story about the genisis and "meaning" of his works every time he spoke to somebody about them; of the Fifth Symphony, he is also reported to have told one of his friends that it was an expression of a frustrated love affair (rather like Walton's near-contemporary First Symphony) - the woman decided to attach her affections to a man called Carmen, instead; which is why the Second Group theme of the First Movement is so similar to the "L'amour" middle section of the Habanera of Bizet's opera.

My own problem with MacDonald (or, at least the first edition of his book; I haven't read the revised version) is the hectoring tone with which he insists that his readings of the works are "the right" ones, and that anyone who "just" hears the Musical mastery is missing the whole point. And his is such a narrow view of the works: they're all about the same thing, according to MacDonald - so much so, that by the time he reaches the last third of his book, even he is saying "yet again we're taken through the same story": it narrows these masterworks down to a monochrome single idea time and again. And he himself has to distort the facts to make the works conform to what he believes they "really" (and exclusively) "mean": the First Movement's Second Group Recapitulation in D major isn't a gentle, tender canonic duet between solo Flute and Horn - it's one dim Soviet citizen praising the Party and being blindly repeated by another. MacDonald even declares the top note in the Horn is "unplayable: deliberately so" in order to demonstrate how contorted people's arguments have to be to fit into the official line. I have six recordings of the work, and have heard it in concert twice and broadcast Live several times - the "unplayable" top note has never been missed. (He also bases his interpretation of the last Movement on a mistranslation of the lyrics of the song Shostakovich quotes.)

That the Fifth Symphony explores (and critiques) the "Tragic = minor; Triumphant = major"-type Symphony is, I think, clear - and, so far as I'm concerned, it is ultimately a Tragic work - but not in the Bernstein performance that the composer so admired - so what can I make of that?! It is a great work; large, containing multitudes and so remarkable that tying it down to a crude (and, in the comfortable sitting rooms of the West, almost prurient) depiction of how grim life is/was under the Soviet regime reduces the possibilities that the work offers. There is more, so much more in the work than MacDonald demands we accept.

[DavidP]

Part of the problem is that Shosty told a different story about the genisis and "meaning" of his works every time he spoke to somebody about them; of the Fifth Symphony, he is also reported to have told one of his friends that it was an expression of a frustrated love affair (rather like Walton's near-contemporary First Symphony) - the woman decided to attach her affections to a man called Carmen, instead; which is why the Second Group theme of the First Movement is so similar to the "L'amour" middle section of the Habanera of Bizet's opera.

My own problem with MacDonald (or, at least the first edition of his book; I haven't read the revised version) is the hectoring tone with which he insists that his readings of the works are "the right" ones, and that anyone who "just" hears the Musical mastery is missing the whole point. And his is such a narrow view of the works: they're all about the same thing, according to MacDonald - so much so, that by the time he reaches the last third of his book, even he is saying "yet again we're taken through the same story": it narrows these masterworks down to a monochrome single idea time and again. And he himself has to distort the facts to make the works conform to what he believes they "really" (and exclusively) "mean": the First Movement's Second Group Recapitulation in D major isn't a gentle, tender canonic duet between solo Flute and Horn - it's one dim Soviet citizen praising the Party and being blindly repeated by another. MacDonald even declares the top note in the Horn is "unplayable: deliberately so" in order to demonstrate how contorted people's arguments have to be to fit into the official line. I have six recordings of the work, and have heard it in concert twice and broadcast Live several times - the "unplayable" top note has never been missed. (He also bases his interpretation of the last Movement on a mistranslation of the lyrics of the song Shostakovich quotes.)

That the Fifth Symphony explores (and critiques) the "Tragic = minor; Triumphant = major"-type Symphony is, I think, clear - and, so far as I'm concerned, it is ultimately a Tragic work - but not in the Bernstein performance that the composer so admired - so what can I make of that?! It is a great work; large, containing multitudes and so remarkable that tying it down to a crude (and, in the comfortable sitting rooms of the West, almost prurient) depiction of how grim life is/was under the Soviet regime reduces the possibilities that the work offers. There is more, so much more in the work than MacDonald demands we accept.

Ferney, that's absolutely right. Shostakovich, I think, even says in the score that if the 'hornist' is unable to play the score as written he can play a lower note (I forget which off the top of my head!) I also agree with you that Shostakovich often made contradictory remarks to people about the meaning and genesis of his music. Even in the aforementioned "Shostakovich Reconsidered" book Maxim calls the 5th his father's 'Heroic' symphony and quotes Shostakovich that the end depicts the hero saying, "I am right. I will follow the way I choose," which contradicts what the composer allegedly told Volkov. Just because party apologists choose to co-opt this as a glorification of Stalin shouldn’t stop us from hearing 'glory' of a different kind.

I find it interesting that the audience at that première stood up while the music was still playing. If they had felt the coded message was “Your business is rejoicing” and the end as "irreparable tragedy" (as Testimony has it) why didn’t they remain seated? Maybe they were getting to their feet because the music was rejoicing, in spite of everything.

So, we could just as easily see the symphony as a conventional Romantic story of an individual overcoming adversity. As you imply, the symphony is in the minor-to-major, darkness-to-light tradition of symphonies from Beethoven onwards. The end, in fact, is rather like that of Mahler’s 3rd. (Not known for being ironically meant.) Mahler’s coda is in the same key and it has the same repeating triads, timpani repeatedly pounding a two-note figure, even similar touches in the orchestration (the trumpets piercing the texture). Mind you, Shostakovich 5 has fiercely pulsating A's in the strings and the winds not to be found in the Mahler!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

No. 5 was the first Shostakovich symphony I heard, in that legendary Bernstein broadcast of 1968(?). My first recording was the Ancerl, but I've had various LP and CD versions since then. The VPO Solti finale sounds as though it is edited from two performances, with a disconcerting tempo change that doesn't sound altogether natural.

I suppose my favourite one are those that are multiples of "5", though my attachment to no. 15 might have something to do with some posing oneupmanship when I wrote an essay about the composer's symphonies when at university. We had been given a rundown of numbers 1-14 by our tutor, but only I knew anything about 15, so I went for it in a big way. Pride is a shocking thing, of course, but the occasional gloat... ?

[BBMmk2]

It's strange, then, as to why Shoata, was saying that, or rather, musicologists, etc, were saying that it's all to0 do with the soviet regime, and all the oppressiveness itnpoutn on the Soviet people?

[silvestrione]

It's strange, then, as to why Shoata, was saying that, or rather, musicologists, etc, were saying that it's all to0 do with the soviet regime, and all the oppressiveness itnpoutn on the Soviet people?

Do you feel the need to write in code, Brassbandmaestro?

[Bryn]

One of the more interesting commentators on the Fifth, I feel, is Gerard McBurney. The notes by him which accompany the CBSO CD of Hypothetically Murdered offer intriguing detail on quotes used by Shostakovich in the symphony. Sitting on a rock on Ness Beach, I don't have immediate access to those notes, but they, and the disc, are well worth seeking out.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

It's strange, then, as to why Shoata, was saying that, or rather, musicologists, etc, were saying that it's all to0 do with the soviet regime, and all the oppressiveness itnpoutn on the Soviet people?

Well, it's interesting that, in the West at least, such parallels were not mentioned until after the appearance of Testimony - critical comment by Robert Layton, Hugh Ottaway, Norman Kay and Tim Souster make no such references (and Souster, defending the Finale against charges of "bombast", clearly states that if the conductor carefully follows the composer's tempo gradations, the movement "builds up to a genuinely 'triumphant' conclusion"). US newspaper critics tended to resent the performance of "Red propaganda" on the programmes of American Symphony orchestras - so no detection of covert anti-Soviet programmes there.

But the basic idea in Testimony that the last bars are bitter, rather than celebratory couldn't've struck so resonant a chord with so many listeners and performers if there were not suspicions already provided by the Music itself. The sense of failure in the midst of everyone else's success is uncannily presented in the Music for many of us - a remarkable achievement that is/may be based in the composer's experiences, but which he communicates to the countless generations who will, thankfully, never endure the experience of living under a totalitarian regime.

[Nick Armstrong]

Wot no comment on this BAL yet? Was it underwhelming, or is it due to all that nice sunshine outside...?

Haven't been able to hear the programme myself, it's going to accompany a Sunday lie-in

[LeMartinPecheur]

Please tell me the winner and who else made the frame! Managed to stay with it into the Scherzo but then my attention wandered. OK, I fell asleep<doh>

This may reflect that I wasn't finding it that revelatory...

Did LSO/Previn ever get a mention??

[mercia]

Jansons/VPO 'won' - Ancerl, Haitink, Mravinsky (can't remember which one) and Kondrashin were in the running

[amateur51]

It was an interesting BaL but I found Geoffrey Norris' approach (informed by lots of stopwatch timings) a bit boggling after a while. If I were listening afresh, I'd blank his timing references out because as he says himself, it matters more what the conductor does with the music than just how long it takes to do it

I'll certainly try to listen to the Jansons/VPO winner on Monday just after 11.00 with Sarah Walker.