Shostakovich: which one is your favourite amongst his works?

[Roehre]

Not at all - the same applies IMO to Fidelio and many works of literature.

The banality of that symphony is in the context of the banality of evil . A work that is expressly related to a historical event should be considered and listened to in that context.

That would mean that a listener who doesn't know the work and by chance hears it were unable to appreciate it fully.
I've got some reservations re the Seventh (certainly in comparison with 4, 8, 10 and 15), but I do think it would do the symphony no justice if it were only to be appreciated fully if the circumstances of its composition were known to the listener.

[Richard Barrett]

I think the Leningrad symphony is a masterpiece . It has to be understood in the context of its time and listened to in that manner .

It is undoubtedly vastly superior to self indulgent barbed wire nonsense such as the Lachenmann played at the Proms

Your silly comment about Lachenmann places your thoughts about Shostakovich's 7th and the way it "has to be understood" in a rather unflattering light, but apart from that I don't believe any music "has to be understood" in some specific way. Who decides how some artwork has to be understood? You?

[Barbirollians]

Your silly comment about Lachenmann places your thoughts about Shostakovich's 7th and the way it "has to be understood" in a rather unflattering light, but apart from that I don't believe any music "has to be understood" in some specific way. Who decides how some artwork has to be understood? You?

One man's silly comment is another's profound opinion . I find edashtav's opinion of the Leningrad " silly " in the extreme .

[johnb]

A work that is expressly related to a historical event should be considered and listened to in that context.

I think it is unwise to regard the 7th as just being "about" the siege of Leningrad. In Elizabeth Wilson's book Flora Litvinova (whom the Shostakovich family befriended in Kuibyshev following their evacuation from the besieged city) quotes DDS as saying about the 7th:

"Of course - Fascism. But music, real music, can never be literally tied to a theme. National Socialism is not the only form of Fascism; this music is about all forms or terror, slavery, the bondage of the spirit."

[Barbirollians]

I think it is unwise to regard the 7th as just being "about" the siege of Leningrad. In Elizabeth Wilson's book Flora Litvinova (whom the Shostakovich family befriended in Kuibyshev following their evacuation from the besieged city) quotes DDS as saying about the 7th:

I accept that entirely . It is not a simplistic programmatic work but I still believe its context to be important to its appreciation.

[Richard Barrett]

One man's silly comment is another's profound opinion . I find edashtav's opinion of the Leningrad " silly " in the extreme .

So two silly comments make a profound opinion do they? Let me ask again - who decides how a piece of music "has to be understood?" If someone appreciates Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony without knowing how it "has to be understood", does this make them wrong? would it be "better" for them not to appreciate it until they'd done their homework?

[ahinton]

So two silly comments make a profound opinion do they? Let me ask again - who decides how a piece of music "has to be understood?" If someone appreciates Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony without knowing how it "has to be understood", does this make them wrong? would it be "better" for them not to appreciate it until they'd done their homework?

Quite; I do not imagine that Shostakovich's own answers to these questions would be hard to predict had they been addressed to him. I suppose that one way to get reliable answers to them today would be to play a good recording of the work to two people of whom neither had previously heard it but of whom one had been told much about the background against which it had been written but the other been told nothing at all of this and then to assess their respective responses afterwards. The idea of dictating to other people how they "should" listen to and how they're supposed to "understand" any piece of music strikes me as even more abhorrent than it is absurd.

[jean]

My favourite is usually the one I heard most recently - today it's no 13, Babi Yar, RLPO with Petrenko last night.

[Mary Chambers]

My favourite is usually the one I heard most recently - today it's no 13, Babi Yar, RLPO with Petrenko last night.

It was well done, I thought, though my Russian is limited to about a dozen words so I'm not able to judge the finer points.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

My favourite is usually the one I heard most recently - today it's no 13, Babi Yar, RLPO with Petrenko last night.

A friend of mine was singing in that - he said the Russian was a beggar to master!

[Mary Chambers]

I have sung Rachmaninov and Prokofiev in Russian, and it isn't easy at first, but it's really enjoyable! They sounded as if they knew what they were singing about - quite convincing as far as I could tell.

My dozen words of normal spoken Russian are tourist stuff, not terribly useful musically.

[Roehre]

It was well done, I thought, though my Russian is limited to about a dozen words so I'm not able to judge the finer points.

That's an advantage IMO, as e.g. Janet Baker's gorgeous singing for me is marred by her German (and French for that matter) pronunciation e.g.

[Tevot]

Hello there,

Re the OP :-

I'm currently listening to some Shostakovich via Youtube - the 7 Romances on Verses by Alexander Blok ( music of stern beauty, written the year after Cello Concerto no. 2 which is another work I really like...)

There's also the the 5 Romances on Texts from Krokodil which is well worth a listen or two imho what with the DSCH motifs and the Dies Irae too - very much a prototype of the later Michelangelo sonnets (the orchestral version of which at least to my ears has numerous echoes of the 15th symphony)

Then there are the settings of Marina Tsvetayeva's poems too. I find myself drawn to his later works ...

As far as chamber music is concerned SQ 11 somehow sticks in my mind - brief, elusive, almost perfunctory and yet... Also SQ 12. Not forgetting two late sonatas for Violin and Viola respectively...

As for the Symphonies ... I must say that over the years No 13 has grown on me a great deal.

Best Wishes,

Tevot

[edashtav]

One Man's Silly is Another's Extremity!

One man's silly comment is another's profound opinion . I find edashtav's opinion of the Leningrad " silly " in the extreme .

May I ask you to withdraw the insulting "silly" and replace it with "extreme", Barbirollians?

Silly implies foolish or thoughtless, and my reaction, extreme as it was, was based on critically listening to the work (finding it wanting), reading around the subject, consulting other evidence (e,g. from Bartok), and reading a library score. I have admitted my reactions are 25 years out-of-date, but they were not unconsidered. Do we not all accept that there is a rainbow of works that came from DSCH's pen from the frankly popular and sometimes crass pieces written, if not by order from above, at least with the idea of tempering the displeasure of the authorities [ do try listening to The Fall of Berlin, 1949] to many masterpieces? I found the Leningrad to be popularist, poster-paint stuff, an occasional piece (think of Beethoven's Wellington's Siege & Victory; no don't the Leningrad isn't THAT facile) crude in construction, lacking intellectual challenge, and containing too little complexity to engage my "silly" mind.


Poor silly me!

[Beef Oven!]

First Team:

Symphony #4 ******
Symphony #15 ****
24 Preludes & Fugues For Piano ****
String Quartets 3, 8 & 15 *****

On The Bench:

Piano Concerto #1 For Piano, String Orchestra & Crumpet (best played when hungry)
Symphony #5