Prom 69: Boston Symphony Orchestra Bernstein and Shostakovich – 3.09.18

[ahinton]

I still feel that whilst Shostakovich’s 4th has defensible virtues, it is not to be rated as great. On my side of the divide is Robin Holloway who wrote a savage piece in the magazine The Spectator in 1907.

2007, actually; the article (which I read for the first time only quite recently) is indeed savage - or is it merely petulant? Readers must decide for themselves...

(Sympony) No.1 still remains a perfect product of adolescent genius, setting up all his later routines with effervescent freshness and brevity – perky, energetic, hectic, sentimental, tragic – before they set in cement.

Correct until that last bit.

The wild constructivism of the next two [B] and the sheer bravura excess of the 4th can sweep all before them provided one doesn't look too closely.

Assuming that, by "look", Holloway means "listen", is this statement intended to imply that the many who have conducted this symphony over the past six decades have not listened "too closely"? If so, that's quite an indictment!

The terrible nature of Shostakovich's circumstances mustn't prevent a balanced response to his actual notes. If it does, emotional blackmail is committed, which for all its rewards involves illusion and delusion – a flattering identification with suffering heroism, a holier-than-thou priggishness in the rush to empathise with oppression. To deplore this is to risk appearing stony-hearted. But what else is there to go on, in works of art, but their artistic workmanship – in music, the actual notes? All human experience can be encompassed and expressed in music's actual notes, when they show themselves to be capable of containing what's entrusted to them.

Fine, insofar as it goes - but the general tenor of the article is one that seems hell bent on assuring readers that Holloway detests most of Shostakovich's work with a vengeance and he must be right and anyone who disagrees with him must be wrong. Oddly, he singles out the Fourteenth Symphony for priase which he then knocks dow but claiming that this, too, spawned yet more formulaic rehashings.

You will note that Holloway’s second paragraph deals with what I term the “special pleading” for DSCH that is evident in Jayne’s defence of his music.

It does indeed, at least in principle, yet not only do I find no such "special pleading" in what Jayne writes in "defence" of Shostakovich's best works (and for the Fourth Symphony in particular), Shostakovich and his Fourth Symphony need no "special pleading" nor "defence" in the first place! "Special pleading" and "defence" are customarily reserved by some for certain works that are neglected and/or under-appreciated; one could hardly describe Shostakovich's as falling into such a category as though he were some kind of musical outsider!

I shall end this post by quoting Pierre putting a bit more detail about his Shostakovian blind-spot:

Boulez never conducted the music of Shostakovich. "I have to tell you that I have very mixed feelings about this music. It is often said that Shostakovich is the `more recent' equivalent of Mahler; but I would say that to compare Shostakovich with Mahler is like comparing Meyerbeer with Wagner. The musical substance of his work is trivial. Okay, I can accept that he worked under great pressure, that he was afraid and that he rebelled discreetly. But, for me, that's not enough of an excuse." (Independent, 29 Jan 1999)

Thank you for this. So Boulez claimed to have "mixed" feelings about Shostakovich's music; he's told us in no uncertain terms about the negative ones, so what were the positive ones that are implied by this statement? IS it - or rather WAS it - ever "often said that Shostakovich is the 'more recent' equivalent of Mahler"? I've never heard this; indeed, the nearest that I have heard to it is mention that, in the Fourth Symphony, he came closer to Mahler than anywhere else in his output which, up to a point, is not entirely unfair, but it's hardly the same thing. Perhaps I move in the wrong circles and that's why I've never encountered such comments as Boulez states were "often" made. Comparing Shostakovich with Mahler and comparing Meyerbeer with Wagner are similar only to the exten of their proving that, as the cliché has it, "comparisons are odious" and, in this case, also utterly pointless beyond the fact that Mahler and Shostakovich each contributed substantially to the symphonic repertoire (but then so did Haydn, Beethoven, Bruckner, Brahms and others) and Meyerbeer and Wagner are each principally known for their stage works (but then so are Verdi and Puccini). So "the musical substance of his work is trivial"; well, to Maître Boulez, obviously - and evidently also to Robin Holloway - but not to a great many others. It's good to read that Boulez could "accept that he worked under great pressure, that he was afraid and that he rebelled discreetly" - even Sorabji, most uncharacteristically failed to understand that in the days when he heaped scorn on Shostakovich - but did Shostakovich really compromise his work as a direct consequence of that fear? If he did (and I see scant evidence of it), there were many times when it clearly did him no favours! No, Boulez was temperamentally allergic to Shostakovich as Robin Holloway also seems to be - but then Boulez was well known for his scathing barbs in the early days of his career and I understand that Shostakovich is by no means alone in coming under the Holloway hammer; indeed, in a review of a broadcast of another living composer's work, he actually asked "but is it music?" It's a pity that Holloway is given to this koind of thing in his journalistic work because, at his best, he's a very fine composer indeed.

[edashtav]

I agree with you, ahinton, that Robin Holloway, at his best, is a very fine, if conservative, composer.

Perhaps, he’s outgrown his wild man (Fauvist ?) phase of 2007?

[ahinton]

I agree with you, ahinton, that Robin Holloway, at his best, is a very fine, if conservative, composer.

Perhaps, he’s outgrown his wild man (Fauvist ?) phase of 1907.

I don't know - and perhaps I might rather not find out!...

[Serial_Apologist]

Is it likely that Boulez's antipathy to Shostakovitch's music might have stemmed from its having evolved from a tradition peripheral to the Germanic tradition as represented by Mahler and therefore thought to be "impure"?

[Boilk]

Is it likely that Boulez's antipathy to Shostakovitch's music might have stemmed from its having evolved from a tradition peripheral to the Germanic tradition as represented by Mahler and therefore thought to be "impure"?

But then didn't Stravinsky's music evolve from that same tradition? Would be interesting to know what Boulez's thoughts (if ever voiced?) were on Prokofiev.

[edashtav]

I failed to make myself clear over what I meant by Jayne’s special pleading, ahinton.
This is her passage which implies that we should give resoect to works created in the heat of real emotion.
Neither I or Robin Holloway think that should be so.

Do I really have to remind members of this forum that "Symphony No.4 by Shostakovich" is ONE OF THE GREATEST SYMPHONIES OF THE 20TH CENTURY - and that its composer lived through a time of extreme personal and societal suffering and oppression which we can but barely imagine, whatever we've read about it?

That this physical and emotional suffering is an essential part of the sound and expression of a symphony which, if it had had contemporary performance and international exposure, could have changed the course of musical and political history?

Show the man who created this some respect!

[Serial_Apologist]

But then didn't Stravinsky's music evolve from that same tradition? Would be interesting to know what Boulez's thoughts (if ever voiced?) were on Prokofiev.

I would say not, with regards to Stravinsky. From what I understand of Boulez's angle he would probably regard the whole Russian contribution going back to Glinka as a departure from the "main" tradition's central tenets, as inscribed in harmony and formal procedure in music of the Austro-Germanic tradition from Bach onwards to its dissolution under the Nazi regime and vestigial remnants in Webern, and therefore as a sideshow from The Most Important Issues dealt with from within that tradition with its sense of historical inevitability. The early Symphony in E would be seen as a diluted mish-mash of Germanic and Russian traits; not until the "return" to classical formalities occasioned by the inevitability of Stravinsky's emigration as he presumably saw it do we see engagement, but if one listens to the Neo-Classical works this is engagement of a very externalised kind, and one which Boulez likened to preferring imitation Georgian furniture to the modern. Perhaps he saw Shostakovitch as peripheral in relation to what he saw as germane (no pun) to 20th century musical evolution; if he is equally antagonistic to Prokofiev it would probably be towards the latter's symphonies, the last two containing their fair share of Mahlerian influence too, rather than the ballets and (just maybe) the concertos, which were part of the Russian tradition belonging to Tchaikovsky that didn't seek to emulate or be influenced by the Beethoven-Schoenberg continuum, and whose idiom is not so far removed from those of Bartok, whom he did admire. Boulez didn't seem much interested in signifiers, in the sense of music communicating from perceived common culturo-linguistic roots; The Rite was interesting as a modernist break with the outworn in Russian music as Pelleas was with the Wagnerian inheritance diluted in Chausson et al. I'm really clutching at straws here, as is probably apparent!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Surely Boulez regarded Stravinsky as part of the Franco-Russian tradition - the direct "heir" of Musorgsky and Debussy? (And Prokofiev - or at least the Prokofiev of the Scythian Suite, which he included in his concerts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjVGLrudHRs )

... Varese, Carter, and Bartok, too. Boulez himself seemed to have regarded the Austro-German Symphonic Tradition as having reached an end by the time of the Second Viennese School (the only later German composer whose work he expressed any interest in was Stockhausen). It seems that he looked to the "alternative" traditions emerging from the "peripheries" for his core repertoire. The Symphonic tradition of Shostakovich - or Martinu - couldn't offer him anything he could use. (His late interest in and appreciation of RVW is remarkable in this light.)

[edashtav]

Surely Boulez regarded Stravinsky as part of the Franco-Russian tradition - the direct "heir" of Musorgsky and Debussy? (And Prokofiev - or at least the Prokofiev of the Scythian Suite, which he included in his concerts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjVGLrudHRs )

... Varese, Carter, and Bartok, too. Boulez himself seemed to have regarded the Austro-German Symphonic Tradition as having reached an end by the time of the Second Viennese School (the only later German composer whose work he expressed any interest in was Stockhausen). It seems that he looked to the "alternative" traditions emerging from the "peripheries" for his core repertoire. The Symphonic tradition of Shostakovich - or Martinu - couldn't offer him anything he could use. (His late interest in and appreciation of RVW is remarkable in this light.)

Picking up on ferney’s reminder that Boulez programmed one of Prokofiev’s works most influenced by fauvism, I’ve had another dig for comments by PB on SP. There is one, again taken from the 1999 interview by Rob Cowan published in the Independent...
“ And what about Shostakovich's more adventurous later works? Surely they are less sullied by compromise than some of his earlier pieces?
Boulez is immovable. "By then, he was under less pressure - and that's all. It's very easy to listen to, but if you compare it with The Rite of Spring or the best works of Prokofiev - there's no contest. [ my emboldening] Shostakovich was at his best when he was young and spontaneous, and at his worst when he wanted to be heroic."

That clip offers some support to Serial-Apologist’s thesis, doesn’t it?

[edashtav]

This piece , although dated in some respects, from The Atlantic Magazine (09.1995) touches on some of the issues raised in this thread. It was written by David Schiff.

“Boulez's biases suggest a direct link between the composer and the conductor: he conducts only works that relate to his own creative agenda--works that, as he says, open up "new terrain." Boulez conducts these pieces as if they were his own, stripping them of their historical roots. He is interested not in connecting Mahler with Bruckner (whom he never conducts), or Webern with Brahms (ditto), but rather in showing how Mahler and Webern point the way to Boulez. This may sound narcissistic, but it has enabled Boulez to bring unique insights to his interpretations.

If Boulez's early career can be compared to that of a math genius, in his later phase he appears to be more a master politician, in the French manner. Having exhausted his own new terrain by age thirty-five, Boulez has spent the rest of his life administering it and erecting monuments, both physical and virtual. The physical monument is IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et de Coordination Acoustique Musique), Boulez's personal Kremlin for research and development, at the Beaubourg, in Paris. The virtual monument is his recorded repertory.”

[jayne lee wilson]

Picking up on ferney’s reminder that Boulez programmed one of Prokofiev’s works most influenced by fauvism, I’ve had another dig for comments by PB on SP. There is one, again taken from the 1999 interview by Rob Cowan published in the Independent...
“ And what about Shostakovich's more adventurous later works? Surely they are less sullied by compromise than some of his earlier pieces?
Boulez is immovable. "By then, he was under less pressure - and that's all. It's very easy to listen to, but if you compare it with The Rite of Spring or the best works of Prokofiev - there's no contest. [ my emboldening] Shostakovich was at his best when he was young and spontaneous, and at his worst when he wanted to be heroic."

That clip offers some support to Serial-Apologist’s thesis, doesn’t it?

All it seems to show is how little Boulez understood. Symphonies 13-15 are neither "young" nor "heroic". They are a late, closely related trilogy of tragic masterpieces. "Songs and Dances of Death" as I said.
The 15th is a remarkable reflection on a whole symphonic cycle.... on a whole, tragic life and death.... studded with references back...
Was Boulez simply baffled by the coda? Or unable to face the appallingly bleak, raw intensity of its climaxes? In the finale, this sounds like the death-throes of a huge, primitive animal... yet - what happens after that? No wonder it still seems such an impossible, terrible thing to face...(its close links to No.4 are surely no accident).

"Spontaneous"? I'm not even sure what that means in this context.

The 6th, 9th, 10th? The 10th is only heroic to the superficial listener. It has a haunted, crazy, manic quality to its undoubted relief and exultation...
D-S-C-H! D-S-C-H! No heroism there, just a desperate attempt at personal assertion for the sake of psychical survival...

After the 10th has ended, how long do you feel "triumphant" or "exultant" for? How long before you start to think...
OK....what just happened back there, really...?

***
I wonder which works Boulez felt were Prokofiev's best? Probably not the Symphonies 5-7, something of a late, tragic trilogy in themselves...

[Serial_Apologist]

Surely Boulez regarded Stravinsky as part of the Franco-Russian tradition - the direct "heir" of Musorgsky and Debussy? (And Prokofiev - or at least the Prokofiev of the Scythian Suite, which he included in his concerts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjVGLrudHRs )

... Varese, Carter, and Bartok, too. Boulez himself seemed to have regarded the Austro-German Symphonic Tradition as having reached an end by the time of the Second Viennese School (the only later German composer whose work he expressed any interest in was Stockhausen). It seems that he looked to the "alternative" traditions emerging from the "peripheries" for his core repertoire. The Symphonic tradition of Shostakovich - or Martinu - couldn't offer him anything he could use. (His late interest in and appreciation of RVW is remarkable in this light.)

I think Stravinsky was within the Franco-Russian tradition... up to the start of the Neo-Classical phase (around 1923) - after which the Franco-Russian tradition... or rather the French tradition, converged towards Stravinsky, under his influence (as much if not more than Satie's). This continued at least as far as Messiaen's work of the 1940s, in which the Fauvist period (Edashtav characterises with vivid allusiveness!) came strongly to the fore, though it had been referred to early on in the previous decade, maybe through passing stylistic sympathies with Jolivet. But what you say about Boulez's attraction to the "peripheries" accords with his affinities with the non-symphonic aspects of Bartók (who significantly never composed one) and Prokofiev. Oddly enough (maybe) I would disagree about Varèse, Carter and Bartók, all three of whom I would place closer to the Austro-Germanic tradition - or the ways in which Schoenberg was channelling that tradition - than to the Russian and/or the French. Sure, the first mature Varèse works we know of could not have existed were it not for "Le Sacre"; but "Amériques" actually contains at least one direct quotation from "Péripatie", and Varèse goes much further than "Le Sacre" in musical abstraction. Carter audibly re-orientates Schoenbergwards after 1948, previous to which his work had represented a more cerebral version of Stravinskyian Neo-Classicism - Sessions had followed a similar route, maybe Dallapiccola too - but I would include Bartók in this, in his blending of Strauss and Debussy. The picture is complicated by the influence exerted by Debussy at the point at which he began turning for inspiration towards Magyar folk musics and away from gypsy music Lisztian referencing, eg around the years 1907-8, because in the Second Orchestral Suite, completed in 1907 he is clearly taking an advancing harmonic route parallel with that of Schoenberg two years previously in the First Chamber Symphony. In fact I'm sure I read somewhere that Bartók was having difficulties in getting this work accepted by his regular publisher, and that Schoenberg had come to the rescue by getting his publisher to put it out. Some of the "Bagatelles" are remarkably close to the harmonic world of Schoenberg's Op 11, and there are passages in the first string quartet not a mile from the Austrian's first and second. It has been said, probably by more than one writer, that folk music "saved" Bartok from atonality; however, I would argue that the work in the 1920s - especially the two violin sonatas and the third and fourth quartets, represented a reconciliation of Schoenbergian compositional methods, particularly as regards contrapuntal workouts, with the melodic implications of folk inspirations - by this stage transcending the issue of nationality - and their harmonic implications. Had not Bartok fallen in love with folk music I believe he would have gone the atonal route - perhaps not completely, but some indication of what those consequences might have been could be said to come through in some of the music Mátyás Seiber composed in the 1950s, and in the "Funeral Music" of Lutoslawsky of 1958.

When it comes to which side of the argument re-Shostakovitch I come down on, if that's not being too melodramatic, Holloway's or Jane's, I have to confess to finding myself firmly on the fence - I tend to "make allowances" for what may seem to be musical deficiencies if the composer's "case" seems to transcend issues of aesthetic integrity.

[Bryn]

But Bartok did write a symphony, in 1902. You can even find it on Youtube.

[Serial_Apologist]

But Bartok did write a symphony, in 1902. You can even find it on Youtube.

Really?? I'll check for that!

[Bryn]

Really?? I'll check for that!

A 2 piano (or maybe piano 4 hands) version has turned up on TtN at least a couple of times.