Shostakovich: which one is your favourite amongst his works?

[Nick Armstrong]

My favourite among the works attributed to this person is the First Symphony, which was actually written by his teacher (most of it). I am sorry to say that all the rest I find truly hateful productions. (My reasons: he was incapable of writing a good tune, he had no sense of harmony, and he was not a serious person.)

OI !





I almost took you seriously for a nanosecond there...

[vinteuil]

I almost took you seriously for a nanosecond there...

... I think m'learnèd friend probably meant femtosecond.... or possible attosecond ....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femtosecond

.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attosecond

.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanosecond

[ Me, it was somewhere between a yoctosecond and a zeptosecond .... ]

[Quarky]

Dimitri Shostakovich: which one is your favourite amongst his works?

Without reading the whole of this thread, I wouldn't know whether his string quartets have been cited as yet.

But as far as I am concerned, any and all of his 15 string quartets are my favourite, in particular no. 8.

In fact I would rate these string quartets above those of any other composer, including Bartok and Beethoven (having played these to death!)

[ahinton]

... I think m'learnèd friend probably meant femtosecond.... or possible attosecond ....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femtosecond

.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attosecond

.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanosecond

[ Me, it was somewhere between a yoctosecond and a zeptosecond .... ]

"Time" for someone to walk the "Planck" methinks (no prizes for guessing who, of course!)...

[ahinton]

Dimitri Shostakovich: which one is your favourite amongst his works?

Without reading the whole of this thread, I wouldn't know whether his string quartets have been cited as yet.

But as far as I am concerned, any and all of his 15 string quartets are my favourite, in particular no. 8.

In fact I would rate these string quartets above those of any other composer, including Bartok and Beethoven (having played these to death!)

I'd not go quite that far but I'd certainly place them on a level with these.

[Op. XXXIX]

His first symphony was written by no one but himself

What I had always thought too.

All rather a relief since the 1st Symphony is one of my favourite (amongst many, many) of Shostakovich's works. Also I would like to put in a for the 1st Piano Concerto.

[richardfinegold]

I'd probably have to choose between the 5th and 10th Symphonies or the 8th Quartet, but i have listened to those 3 pieces o much through the years that their very familiarity weighs against them, such as with the case with Beethoven 5th or Mahler 1. So I would have to cast my vote for the 1st, 4th, 8th or 15th Symphonies, the Op. 67 Piano Trio, The Preludes and Fugues, and about a half dozen of the Quartets.

[Stanfordian]

His first symphony was written by no one but himself; from what source did you derive the false impression that it was largely ghost-written? He worked on it from the age of 17 to the age of 19. I am as sorry (and inddeed sorry for you) as I am astonished at the extent of your negative views of his other 144 opus numbered works, not to mention many more without such numbers - and even more so that you believe him to have had "no sense of harmony" and not to be "serious"; do you really believe (and, if so, on what grounds), that the composer of the two violin concertos, the fourth, sixth, eighth, tenth, thirteenth and fifteenth symphonies, the two piano trios, the piano quintet and whichever quartet you care to mention evidenced in these works (chosen by me as entirely random examples) no sense of melody, harmony or seriousness of purpose? You may dislike them all (although it is less than obvious why you would do so if your "favourite" among his works is the first symphony) - that's your prerogative - but to dismiss them as vehemently as you do and in the ways that you do does you no credit whatsoever.

Hiya ahinton,

I love all the Shostakovich symphonies and have been collecting the cycle by the Liverpool Phil under Vasily Patrenko. Off the top of my head I think there is now only one more CD left to be released. In 2010 when I asked Shostakovich specialist Vasily Petrenko about the Shostakovich First Symphony he said: "The first Symphony contains a number of influences. It’s not yet clear Shostakovich in the way that the first Symphony of Tchaikovsky and early Stravinsky before the ballets contain influences of Rimsky-Korsakov... We have also recorded the first Symphony of Shostakovich. I agree it’s a fantastic piece for a student. It’s so very different from his other symphonies because his Symphonies No.2 and No.3 are so exploratory in many ways. He actually said with these symphonies he was trying to find his style. Then there is the fourth Symphony which has links to almost all his symphonies that came later. Yes, the fourth is a great piece of music but we still need to record that."

[Sydney Grew]

. . . I agree it’s a fantastic piece for a student. It’s so very different from his other symphonies . . .

I should have said earlier that the name of the teacher in question was Maximilian Steinberg (sometimes spelled Shteynberg), who published an additional five fine symphonies under his own name.

[Richard Barrett]

I should have said earlier that the name of the teacher in question was Maximilian Steinberg (sometimes spelled Shteynberg), who published an additional five fine symphonies under his own name.

And your evidence that Steinberg composed Shostakovich's first symphony? or do you expect people just to take your word for it?

[Bryn]

There is a Steinberg who might well be cited in connection with this first symphonies origins, but it is not Maximilan but Michael. In his book, The Symphony (published by OUP) he advises that some of the music's origins lie in melodies composed by DDS some years before he started his studies with Maxiilian Steinberg. The music in question was inspired by the fairy tales and fables such as The Ant and the Grasshopper and The Little Mermaid. It would seem that the claim that Maximilian Steinberg was the true composer of the work is but another fairy story.

[ahinton]

Hiya ahinton,

I love all the Shostakovich symphonies and have been collecting the cycle by the Liverpool Phil under Vasily Patrenko. Off the top of my head I think there is now only one more CD left to be released. In 2010 when I asked Shostakovich specialist Vasily Petrenko about the Shostakovich First Symphony he said: "The first Symphony contains a number of influences. It’s not yet clear Shostakovich in the way that the first Symphony of Tchaikovsky and early Stravinsky before the ballets contain influences of Rimsky-Korsakov... We have also recorded the first Symphony of Shostakovich. I agree it’s a fantastic piece for a student. It’s so very different from his other symphonies because his Symphonies No.2 and No.3 are so exploratory in many ways. He actually said with these symphonies he was trying to find his style. Then there is the fourth Symphony which has links to almost all his symphonies that came later. Yes, the fourth is a great piece of music but we still need to record that."

Nos. 2 & 3 are indeed exploratory but, to me, they evidence - indeed in so being - a composer "trying to find his style" more than does No. 1. No. 1 is far more than the "fantastic piece for a student" as which Petrenko nevertheless rightly describes it. No. 4 does indeed have the links to later Shostakovich that Petrenko claims for it and it is not merely prophetic but seems also to have emerged almost from nowhere in its assurance, maturity and overwhelming power of expression. The only one that really disappoints me from the entire cycle is no. 12.

Sorabji, who for years loathed almost everything about Shostakovich other than the first symphony (and in so doing displayed a quite insensitive and dismayingly uncharacteristic lack of understanding of DDS, what motivated him and the strained circumstances under which at times he often found himself living and working), came as late as his 80s to appreciate DDS in what must have been the most significant volte-face in his career, but it was from this very different standpoint that he asked me the presumably rhetorical question as to whether the composer had written no. 12 in his sleep or at gunpoint or both; someone else once said to me that if Ravel's Bolero is indeed a mere "crescendo without music" then Shostakovich's 12th Symphony must be a Shostakovich symphony without the music, a view that I find to be an unfair exaggeration but there's no smoke without fire and that work does strike me as deplorably below what one otherwise expects of and gets from this wonderful composer.

[ahinton]

There is a Steinberg who might well be cited in connection with this first symphonies origins, but it is not Maximilan but Michael. In his book, The Symphony (published by OUP) he advises that some of the music's origins lie in melodies composed by DDS some years before he started his studies with Maxiilian Steinberg. The music in question was inspired by the fairy tales and fables such as The Ant and the Grasshopper and The Little Mermaid. It would seem that the claim that Maximilian Steinberg was the true composer of the work is but another fairy story.

...and one of the most absurd that I've ever encountered!...

[Bryn]

...and one of the most absurd that i've ever encountered!...

Though it would be fair to say that Maximilian Steinberg had some positive input, in that he is said to have dismissed DDS's first thoughts of using the Scherzo Op. 7 as the second movement.

[Roehre]

.... Shostakovich's 12th Symphony must be a Shostakovich symphony without the music, a view that I find to be an unfair exaggeration but there's no smoke without fire and that work does strike me as deplorably below what one otherwise expects of and gets from this wonderful composer.

Is it by chance that Haitink refused to play the 1st and 12th symphonies in public during the recording years of the Symphony cycle with LPO/RCO (btw beginning with LPO for symphony 10 and ending with RCO with again no.10)?