# Irony and Sarcasm in Shostakovich (and in music in general)



## GucciManeIsTheNewWebern (Jul 29, 2020)

This is of course a big trait of Shostakovich's musical personality which is fairly common across his ouevre, but not omnipresent (I don't hear it in the SQs, unless anyone can point out a counterexample). He has a way of creating that saccharinely sinister, devilish whimsy the same of which I've never quite heard from anyone else (I'vr heard Mahler is laden with irony but I have a hard time getting into him). However, it was an acquired taste for me and for a time I used to find it pretty weird and off-putting, which to be fair is sort of the point. 

How do you interpret his sense of irony as a listener? The go to explanation is obviously bitterness towards censorship and subversion by the USSR, but I wonder if it goes deeper than that for any of you. Did anyone else used to be turned off by it as well?


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

The Rayok chamber cantata, hidden for the public in many years, is an example of irony and mocking specifically related to Soviet/Stalinist authorities, also in verbalized form.

In a wider sense I also find Shosty as portraying important trends in the 20th century generally, and I don't feel annoyed by it. There's thus a realist humanism and also accessibility inherent in it, not present in a lot of the hard-core avantgarde of that century.

In the case of the fast movements of say the 9th and 15th symphonies, or the 1st movement of the 1st Cello Concerto etc., I find the irony katharsis- and humour-like as well, and therefore uplifting.


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## Coach G (Apr 22, 2020)

This is an interesting and profound question, and I've always detected an obvious trace of irony, sarcasm, humor, depression, and anger in Shostakovich. Though Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky are different in many ways, I've come to see Shostakovich as being a lot closer to Tchaikovsky, if not musically, then in "spirit" to his contemporaries and fellow-Russians, Serge Prokofiev and Igor Stravinsky; and do I dare speculate a parallel between the rousing third movement of Tchaikovsky's _Symphony #6 "Pathetique"_ and the put-on grand finally to Shostakovich's _Symphony #5_? It seems that here, both Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich are toying with us, as if to say "what are we supposed to be celebrating?" And with Shostakovich,and unlike Prokofiev and Stravinsky, there is always the sad, brooding, soulful Russian quality laced withe tears and vodka.

What's most interesting though, is how different composers process or choose to process their feelings. It's known that Beethoven suffered abuse from an angry and alcoholic father, and as a man, Beethoven himself became angry and probably also an alcoholic. Beethoven's slovenly ways and poor hygiene are legendary. I've read that there wasn't a flat surface in Beethoven's apartment that wasn't occupied by clutter, that an un-emptied chamber pot stunk up the house, and no-wonder that such a slob of man was unable to secure a wife. WE all know what a mess he made of the custody battle he waged over his nephew Karl, and then to top it off was deafness, losing the one thing most vital to a composer and a music-lover.

Even so, Beethoven's music is always up-beat! It's sublime, tight, life-affirming, with not a hint of the excessive brooding that characterizes Tchaikovsky, Mahler, or Shostakovich; except when it is perfectly balanced and followed by a joyous resolution.

Likewise, Prokofiev, also lived under the shadow of Stalin, and if Prokofiev suffered as much as Shostakovich did, he hardly shows it in his works, and even in _Romeo and Juliet_ Prokofiev, I understand, wanted to change the ending so that the star-crossed lovers live happily ever after.


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)




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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

The influence of Mahler on Shostakovich was pretty undeniable, and Shostakovich himself was quite open about it.

But Mahler also exerted an enormous influence on the Second Viennese School. Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern all absolutely _adored_ Mahler, and their music would never have happened as it did without his. They championed Mahler passionately at a time when almost no one did. There's a wonderful photo of Webern conducting Mahler's Sixth (I think) in a pose of absolute ecstasy. I wish I could find It!

Anyway, getting back to Shostakovich: having to veil, behind irony or other means, what you really mean to say in your art is characteristic of quite a lot of Soviet or Soviet-bloc art. It's clearly one of the reasons Shostakovich was drawn to Jewish art, music, and poetry of all kinds, and why he was so attached to a poet like Yevgeny Yevtushenko. Smiles that hide tears. Optimism that hides fear. Sunshine that belies horrific tragedy.

"Sarcasm" is not then the best word to describe this, in my opinion. Irony is better. From contemporary accounts, much of Shostakovich's audience understood what was happening, and Stalin and his minions did as well, and so Shostakovich was always under suspicion for being a subversive. But there was _just_ enough plausible deniability...not to mention tremendous internationally-recognized quality...


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

I heard the Fifth live in Symphony Hall in the mid-'60s (I was about 16), and even then, although the piece captivated me, the parodistic aspects of it were clear. It struck me as being exactly the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like -- while at the same time being an obvious parody of the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like. What an achievement!


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## John Lenin (Feb 4, 2021)

The 'sense of irony' is often put there more by the writer of biography, the press release, the music critic and the conductor than by the composer.... Everything to do with the USSR was ironic if you believe the US press.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

GucciManeIsTheNewWebern said:


> How do you interpret his sense of irony as a listener?


in his _foxtrot_ he, as a stalwart bolshevik, pokes fun at west bourgeois ambitions to conquer the world that fail, of course, and then comes retreat like 'tail between the legs' each time after bravado fanfare onslaught:


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## Christine (Sep 29, 2020)

I love Shosty's 5th. It sounds like a dead-on serious symphony to me with a serious finale rather than a sarcastic or mocking one. However, the _second_, or is it the _third_, movement is kind of goofy and lighthearted, and I really like it, especially the silly ending. Did Shosty ever say outright that the finale is meant to be facetious?


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Sarcasm and irony was always part of Shostakovich's musical make-up but after his 1936 trashing in _Pravda_ these elements had to become more internalised and oblique until well after Stalin's death. As we know, Shostakovich lost many friends and acquaintances from the cultural world of the USSR - the senseless torture and murder in captivity of theatre impresario and collaborator Vsevolod Meyerhold in 1940 was especially hurtful - and maybe Shostakovich felt that it was down to him to somehow chronicle their plight even if he obviously couldn't make direct reference. The texts from a number of Shostakovich's songs from the mid-30s to the mid-50s (one of the more neglected corners of his output) were a conduit for these inner thoughts - and he correctly assumed that no-one from the authorities would be able to detect any coded commentary on contemporary woes.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I think Americans and Westerners see some of Shostakovich as being "ironic" because that's the only way to salvage his compromise and acquiescence to Communism. If he's being "ironic," he's ok.

The fact is, Shostakovich was a Communist, and all that goes with it. I take his music seriously, at face value, as well as his biography. There are times he simply "sold out" and toed the Communist party line completely, and the music suffers for it.

You see? Now that the Cold War is over, we are questioning it. We were in denial.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

MarkW said:


> I heard the Fifth live in Symphony Hall in the mid-'60s (I was about 16), and even then, although the piece captivated me, the parodistic aspects of it were clear. It struck me as being exactly the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like -- while at the same time being an obvious parody of the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like. What an achievement!


Are you sure the parody didn't cancel-out the serious? :lol: I like the Fifth. On film, when Bernstein conducted it in Russia in 1959 I think, Bernstein goes over and hugs Shosty. What a moment!


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

millionrainbows said:


> The fact is, Shostakovich was a Communist, and all that goes with it.


Communist? Yes, certainly.

_Stalinist?_ Not even slightly.

And it was Shostakovich's inward resistance to _Stalinism_, and fascism of all kinds, that fueled what we're discussing. The fact is Shostakovich was always under suspicion under Stalin, and he clearly chafed at that, as well as the degree to which many of his colleagues sold out to Stalin, even worse the torture and death that befell millions of people including some of friends and supporters, and the crude dumbing-down he was expected to kowtow to as a composer.

What is the biggest denial, is denying the reality of all that, and denying the creative paths Shostakovich found to resist it.



> There are times he simply "sold out" and toed the Communist party line completely, and the music suffers for it.


This is true, but in the era of Stalin it was also because he _literally feared for his life_. Anyway his biggest sell-out pieces haven't even come up in this thread.



> You see? Now that the Cold War is over, we are questioning it. We were in denial.


You're in denial if you think the Cold War ended.


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## Coach G (Apr 22, 2020)

millionrainbows said:


> I think Americans and Westerners see some of Shostakovich as being "ironic" because that's the only way to salvage his compromise and acquiescence to Communism. If he's being "ironic," he's ok.
> 
> The fact is, Shostakovich was a Communist, and all that goes with it. I take his music seriously, at face value, as well as his biography. There are times he simply "sold out" and toed the Communist party line completely, and the music suffers for it.
> 
> You see? Now that the Cold War is over, we are questioning it. We were in denial.


I became caught up in the music of Shostakovich as a teenager in the 1980s when the Cold War was supposed to still be in full swing (at least that what I saw in TV and in the movies with _Red Dawn_, _War Games_, _The Day After_, and I even remember a TV movie, _World War III_, with Rock Hudson as the President of the USA and Brian Kieth as the Premier of the USSR). Little did anyone here in the USA know in those days of the declining Leonid Brezhnev, his successor, Yuri Andropov, and the equally dull and geriatric, Konstantin Chernenko, that the USSR was terminally ill, and that by the time the much younger Mikhail Gorbachev came to power, he was there not so much to reform the Soviet Union but to save it.

In any case, what first attracted to me to Shostakovich was the sound, and even though I now realize that Shostakovich is tonal and fairly traditional, at the time, being completely ignorant of the likes of composers such as Schoenberg and Varese, I thought Shostakovich was the essence of "Modern". It was the symphonies that first grabbed my attention, the 5th (by Rostropovich on DG) and the 11th (by Stokowski on EMI) to be precise; and then I was on a mission to press my ears to all 15 in the Shostakovich cycle.

As for the politics involved in the music of Shostakovich, this is one of those eternal questions of classical music: What did Shostakovich REALLY mean to say?

While I can't answer that question I think a good place to start is with understanding life within a completely totalitarian society where one is constantly manipulated, threatened, and terrorized. In this light, it's perfectly understandable that Shostakovich might have remained a "true believer" and hated Stalin at the same time. Even when Stalin died, his funeral was of the most attended funerals of all time, and there was genuine mourning in that in a patriarchal society where all you know is the dictator; losing the dictator, the father, and "god" is a trauma, even within the trauma of living under totalitarianism. In other words: a trauma within a trauma.

In this sense, it makes sense that Shostakovich would have seen Stalin as having "betrayed the Revolution", and not recognized that as Gorbachev stated several years after he tried to save the communist system, that the system could not be saved because it was faulted from the beginning.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

Coach G said:


> the USSR was terminally ill,


how it was 'terminally ill' while its econoimy was growing and issues sorted?



Coach G said:


> a completely totalitarian society where one is constantly manipulated, threatened, and terrorized.


the masterpieces created in there do not suppoort that claim. Soviets were a happy people.



Coach G said:


> the system could not be saved because it was faulted from the beginning.


not true, because no system that's faulted would be capable of what has been achieved by Soviets.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

that said, why only see the composer as taking on exclusively local issues?

for instance, his 7th symphony portrays France under Nazi rule, with its 1st part containing the description of Wehrmacht march on Paris, the main theme cadence of which refers to a citation from Lehar 'Die Lustige Witwe' count Danilo aria _"then i go to Maxims"_ where Maxim's being analogical to Moulin Rouge:


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

MarkW said:


> I heard the Fifth live in Symphony Hall in the mid-'60s (I was about 16), and even then, although the piece captivated me, the parodistic aspects of it were clear. It struck me as being exactly the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like -- while at the same time being an obvious parody of the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like. What an achievement!


A general premise reminds us that all art is ironical. Aristotle taught us that art is an imitation of nature. The grand irony of art belongs to the notion of that imitation. Why don't humans simply accept nature as it is, why the attempt to imitate it? The grand irony of being human is that we, by way of our consciousness, have separated ourselves from Nature, taking on consciousness and giving up instinct. Creatures of instinct have no need to imitate Nature; they are Nature. Only man walks outside the natural realm, though, ironically, he is as much a part of Nature as any beast.

Irony proves somewhat easier to see in literature. Sophocles great _Oedipus_ play is a study of irony, where irony seems to be the very point of the plot. Oedipus teaches us that we must be blind in order to see. That very notion ties into the irony of humanity -- we must give up instinct in order to possess consciousness. But how does this translate to music?

It's striking that we talk about how music communicates great truths, truths that cannot be rendered with mere words. Those "truths" might well be connected with the human traits we know as feelings, emotion. Again, traits animals don't share. Such things come only from consciousness. Music attempts to reach those deepest pockets of our emotions, that almost mystical aspect of self that is nearly impossible to describe in words, but which we all seem to "instinctively" understand when the music plays.

In discussing irony specifically with Shostakovich and the Fifth Symphony in mind, I concur with MarkW who states: "It struck me as being exactly the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like -- while at the same time being an obvious parody of the kind of piece someone like Stalin would like."

I have always heard the Shostakovich Fifth as a study of two themes in conflict. The first I call the Shostakovich theme, the second the Stalin theme. It seems that in the opening movements the Shostakovich theme is constantly interrupted, overpowered, and trounced by the Stalin theme, but ultimately, in the Finale, the Shostakovich theme comes to the fore and overshadows the Stalin theme, revealing it for what it really is -- a shallow fraud. And the Symphony ends with affirmation of the victory of Shostakovich over Stalin, a victory performed by the presence of the Symphony itself -- a substantially creative and beautiful work of art devised in a regime atmosphere where creativity and beauty (art) was generally frowned upon as something false and mistrustful, certainly not an imitation of Nature at all. In a regime where everything beautiful and natural has become ugly and unnatural, art itself seems counterintuitive. Yet, Shostakovich provides us with its greatest examples. Irony upon ironies.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

SONNET CLV said:


> a regime where everything beautiful and natural has become ugly and unnatural,


spoken of the regime Britten and Vaughan Williams had to live through?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Zhdanov said:


> ...for instance, his 7th symphony portrays France under Nazi rule, with its 1st part containing the description of Wehrmacht march on Paris, the main theme cadence of which refers to a citation from Lehar 'Die Lustige Witwe' count Danilo aria _"then i go to Maxims"_ where Maxim's being analogical to Moulin Rouge:


Could you, or some other Shostakovich symphony expert, list all the symphonies and what their ostensible "themes" are? That would be really interesting. BTW, that's a killer photo of the Tower!


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

millionrainbows said:


> Are you sure the parody didn't cancel-out the serious? :lol: I like the Fifth. On film, when Bernstein conducted it in Russia in 1959 I think, Bernstein goes over and hugs Shosty. What a moment!


All I can say was that that was my impression at the time, and I was either really precocious, or really misguided. But that has colored my impression ever since.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

millionrainbows said:


> Could you, or some other Shostakovich symphony expert, list all the symphonies and what their ostensible "themes" are?


some "other expert" could, i suppose.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_I heard the Fifth live in Symphony Hall in the mid-'60s (I was about 16), and even then, although the piece captivated me, the parodistic aspects of it were clear._

Soprano Galina Vishnevskaya famously said the finale of Shostakovich's Fifth Symphony was the children of Russia being torn from the soil.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_Could you, or some other Shostakovich symphony expert, list all the symphonies and what their ostensible "themes" are?_

This is from my Amazon review of the book "The New Shostakovich" second edition where author Ian MacDonald (with help from Volkov's book "Testimony" identified same:

No. 1 -- this is the youthful composer's graduation exercise from the Soviet music academy. He uses subtle tactics from Stravinsky with fateful themes from Tchaikovsky to create one of the greatest first symphonies ever written.

Nos. 2 and 3 -- laboring under the heavy hammer of totalitarian, Shostakovich created nonsensical music dedicated to the revolution. This pair of symphonies should be abandoned by anyone with serious interest in this composer.

No. 4 -- this is Shostakovich spreading his wings, mimicking his admired Mahler, and beginning to tell you how horrible things were for him in the USSR. The cacophonous sections of the first movement are a musical expression for those what awaited a nighttime visit by the secret police, who were then taken off to the gulag for imagined crimes. Shostakovich himself feared such an event, sometimes sleeping in the hallway of his apartment to spare his family the torment of seeing him taken away.

No. 5 -- Shostakovich's famous response to "just criticism", this is the second of what MacDonald calls the "terror" symphonies -- those written during Stalin's regin of terror from the early 1930s until his death in 1953. A seeming paean to Soviet greatness, it's hidden message was explained eloquently by the composer in 'Testimony.' The famous ending, with what the composer called its forced rejoicing, was described by Galina Vishnevskaya as an expression of the sons and daughters of Russia being torn from its soil by Stalin. The composer described it this way: "...what exultation could there be? I think it is clear what happens in the Fifth," he said in 'Testimony.' "The rejoicing is forced, created under a threat...It's as if someone were beating you with a stick and saying, 'Your business is rejoicing, your business is rejoicing' and you rise, shakily, and go marching off muttering, 'Our business is rejoicing, our business is rejoicing,'" a capsulized comment on the goals of Socialist realism in USSR art.

No. 6 -- an intense, dramatic three movement edifice that heralds the platform of both the Violin Concerto No. 1 and Cello Concerto No. 1, it again calls forth the exegises of Soviet totalitarianism. Its lighter, later momments call forth Shostakovich as yurodivy, the clown price whose light message hides much darker secrets.

No. 7 -- written as the Nazis approached Leningrad and given worldwide recognition, MacDonald expounds on the composer's admission in "Testimony" that he was thinking about "other enemies of mankind" besides the Nazis when he wrote this, namely Stalin.

No. 8 -- the first great masterpiece symphony, MacDonaled explains that this is indeed about totalitarianism and the terror, with its unrelenting darkness and drive today better understood in these terms than during the war years.

No. 9 -- the yurodivy masterpiece, the absurd celebration of success in World War II with the section of Stalin puffing himself up like a frog, that Shostakovich survived over Stalin's disappointment.

No. 10 -- perhaps his greatest symphonic edifice, this music is a characterization of Stalin and his times with the second movement a caricature of the dictator.

No. 11 -- renewing the composer's comments in "Testimony", MacDonald further explains the parallel's between the Russian 1905 pre-revolution of the score and the Soviet military flattening of the 1956 Hungarian uprising.

No. 12 -- written ostensibly to fete Lenin, this is more a bombshell dropped on the shortcomings of the revolutionary hero, with its underground message about repression carried forth from 1917 throughout Shostakovich's life.

No. 13 -- Baba yir is a selection of poems about Jewish represssion the composer set to music during the first thaw under Kruschev. While poet Yevtushenko was forced to rewrite some of his harsher rhetoric -- the Soviet state officially believed there was no ill treatment of Jews -- this is a dissident landmark for Shostakovich, who sympathized with Jews as a repressed minority.

No. 14 -- the songs of death hold numerous keys to second messages in one of the most fascinating sections of the entire book.

No. 15 -- while on its face this is about Shostakovich fiddling with favored music and expanding into serialism under Brezhnev, MacDonald tells you how this is a hidden expression of the composer's anger at the end of his creative life, having lived through the Stalin terror, seeing hundreds of his friends and intellectual equals disappear in the night, and being disappointed by two subsequent dictators, especially the echt-Stalinist Brehznev.

*End review .*.. anyone with interest beyond this should read "Testimony" and/or the paperback update of "The New Shostakovich," not the hardbound original.

American Record Guide also has a nice summary of themes from Shostakovich symphonies in its overview of his symphonies published in the 2000s. I don't recall which year or month. If interested contact ARG by email at [email protected] and ask about the Shostakovich overview reprint. It will only be available in a hardcopy or PDF version.

There's also an outstanding video from Gergiev on the war symphonies that features some of the composer's friends commenting on his symphonies https://www.amazon.com/Shostakovich...alin+the+war+symphonies&qid=1612893543&sr=8-2


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## mparta (Sep 29, 2020)

Coach G said:


> This is an interesting and profound question, and I've always detected an obvious trace of irony, sarcasm, humor, depression, and anger in Shostakovich. Though Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky are different in many ways, I've come to see Shostakovich as being a lot closer to Tchaikovsky, if not musically, then in "spirit" to his contemporaries and fellow-Russians, Serge Prokofiev and Igor Stravinsky; and do I dare speculate a parallel between the rousing third movement of Tchaikovsky's _Symphony #6 "Pathetique"_ and the put-on grand finally to Shostakovich's _Symphony #5_? It seems that here, both Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich are toying with us, as if to say "what are we supposed to be celebrating?" And with Shostakovich,and unlike Prokofiev and Stravinsky, there is always the sad, brooding, soulful Russian quality laced withe tears and vodka.
> 
> What's most interesting though, is how different composers process or choose to process their feelings. It's known that Beethoven suffered abuse from an angry and alcoholic father, and as a man, Beethoven himself became angry and probably also an alcoholic. Beethoven's slovenly ways and poor hygiene are legendary. I've read that there wasn't a flat surface in Beethoven's apartment that wasn't occupied by clutter, that an un-emptied chamber pot stunk up the house, and no-wonder that such a slob of man was unable to secure a wife. WE all know what a mess he made of the custody battle he waged over his nephew Karl, and then to top it off was deafness, losing the one thing most vital to a composer and a music-lover.
> 
> ...


really? Beethoven always upbeat? I was watching the Abbado Lucerne Eroica this weekend and floored by the tragedy of the funeral march. Much else. Beethoven is a universe, no limit to his emotional reach, including the lows.

And Prokofiev made the ending of Romeo and Juliet into one of the big and most heart-rending melodies ever penned. I think his proclivity was to sass, as you suggest, and he certainly excelled there, but he had other in him.

Maybe the best big raspberry from Shostakovich comes from his setting of Gogol. The old Soviet film of the Nose is off the wall.

And Shostakovich was actually the victim of a little bitter ridicule from Bartok in the Concerto for Orchestra, in response to the 7th symphony.

All so complicated.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

larold said:


> No. 15


DSCH's 15th symph contains _Der Ring Des Nibelungen_ and _Guillermo Tell_ motifs.

of Der Ring, its The Curse Of The Ring leitmotiv:






the symphony's coda & finale portray a dead body getting lifeless and cold:








larold said:


> MacDonald tells you how this is a hidden expression of the composer's anger at the end of his creative life, having lived through the Stalin terror, seeing hundreds of his friends and intellectual equals disappear in the night, and being disappointed by two subsequent dictators, especially the echt-Stalinist Brehznev.


that fellow tells bullschit.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_Likewise, Prokofiev, also lived under the shadow of Stalin, and if Prokofiev suffered as much as Shostakovich did, he hardly shows it in his works, and even in Romeo and Juliet Prokofiev, I understand, wanted to change the ending so that the star-crossed lovers live happily ever after._

Prokofiev spent much of his life in Paris and was, with Stravinsky, known as a "French" Russian composer. "After the Revolution of 1917, Prokofiev left Russia with the official blessing of the Soviet minister Anatoly Lunacharsky, and resided in the United States, then Germany, then Paris," Wikipedia says. He did come back to Russia 1936 and stayed until dying 1953 -- the same day as Stalin.


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_that fellow tells bullschit._

that's an opinion not shared by Shostakovich's son Maxim, any of his friends, Galina Vishnevskaya, Tatiana Nickolayeva, Vladimir Ashkenazy and most of the people that knew him when alive. His wife's only doubt about "Testimony" is she believed the author did not spend sufficient time with Dmitri to unearth all that.

Even in academic circles today that doubt the authenticity of such books there is still an acceptance that Shostakovich was the person portrayed in them.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

no way he would have said anything like this -



larold said:


> he said in 'Testimony.' "The rejoicing is forced, created under a threat...It's as if someone were beating you with a stick and saying, 'Your business is rejoicing, your business is rejoicing' and you rise, shakily, and go marching off muttering, 'Our business is rejoicing, our business is rejoicing,'" a capsulized comment on the goals of Socialist realism in USSR art.


- no such "testimony" exists, other than by CIA or MI6 shills.


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## Coach G (Apr 22, 2020)

mparta said:


> really? Beethoven always upbeat? I was watching the Abbado Lucerne Eroica this weekend and floored by the tragedy of the funeral march. Much else. Beethoven is a universe, no limit to his emotional reach, including the lows...


OK, so to put in perspective, Beethoven was upbeat compared to Shostakovich. Yes, Beethoven has that really dreary funeral march in the _7th Symphony_ but the opening is sunshine and flowers, and the finale is blissful triumph. Now I'm sure we could find a few other examples where we find Beethoven in a sad mood, and maybe a few where Shostakovich is quite light-hearted (As in the 2 piano concertos or the first movement of mysterious _Symphony #15_); but I'm generalizing for the sake of making argument, and basically saying that Shostakovich was generally no laugh-riot; and you probably wouldn't break out your Shostakovich records at a party.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

This "Zhdanov" in the thread is certainly living up to his namesake...

One error this thread is making: focusing on the symphonies so much. You'll never get a complete picture of Shostakovich the composer and the man without the string quartets. He himself said that the symphonies were for the public, and chamber music, especially string quartets, were for his most personal statements. 

Who here thinks the string quartets present anything remotely close to a "rah, rah Communism" or "let's go, Stalin" ethos?

In terms of the symphonies, I think the symphony that presents the closest to Shostakovich's very personal ethos, while remaining a public statement, surely must be the Thirteenth, "Babi Yar." It expresses in the clearest possible terms that 1) he was enormously sympathetic to the plight of European Jews, 2) the critical importance of humor even when literally facing the gallows, 3) how the Soviet system was failing its citizens, especially women, 4) how fear was not dying out in Russia as the text ironically states but rather smothering and stifling everything in sight, and 5) how the only moral escape from this horror is via living an authentic life and career, always staying true to what one knows is right.

Shostakovich was literally forced at gunpoint to read public statements. There is photographic and video footage of some of this, and Shostakovich's demeanor is that of a hostage being forced to say what his captors wish. These public statements, always hugely supportive of the Soviet regime, were very obviously given under duress.

So, where do you find private statements? What Shostakovich had to say, off the record? What he told his very few most trusted friends and family?

You must go to the string quartets. (ETA: the Piano Trio No. 2, Op. 67 is another choice.)


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## larold (Jul 20, 2017)

_no way he would have said anything like this - he said in 'Testimony.' "The rejoicing is forced, created under a threat...It's as if someone were beating you with a stick and saying, 'Your business is rejoicing, your business is rejoicing' and you rise, shakily, and go marching off muttering, 'Our business is rejoicing, our business is rejoicing,'" a capsulized comment on the goals of Socialist realism in USSR art. - no such "testimony" exists, other than by CIA or MI6 shills._

View attachment 150447


You can buy it anywhere books are sold including https://www.amazon.com/Testimony-Me...estimony+volkov&qid=1612893707&s=books&sr=1-1


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Knorf said:


> Who here thinks the string quartets present anything remotely close to a "rah, rah Communism" or "let's go, Stalin" ethos?


It's ironic, remember? So who really knows?

from Amazon review:
String Quartet No. 8
Shostakovich wrote the Quartet in 1960 and dedicated it "To the Memory of Victims of War and Fascism." Today, of course, we may read into it, "victims of war, fascism, and Stalinist Communism." At the time, however, Shostakovich felt very depressed at being forced to join the Communist Party. Some musical historians say that the composer's personal despair is what gives the piece its edge, its pain, and its emotional depth.


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## Zhdanov (Feb 16, 2016)

Knorf said:


> the Thirteenth, "Babi Yar." It expresses in the clearest possible terms that 1) he was enormously sympathetic to the plight of European Jews, 2) the critical importance of humor even when literally facing the gallows, 3) how the Soviet system was failing its citizens, especially women, 4) how fear was not dying out in Russia as the text ironically states but rather smothering and stifling everything in sight,


yeah, one can only guess what horrors of life in the West have been expressed in Bernstein's 2nd symphony - the Great Depression with rampant crime and the famines it created:


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Zhdanov said:


> yeah, one can only guess what horrors of life in the West have been expressed in Bernstein's 2nd symphony - the Great Depression with rampant crime and the famines it created...


Beyond any shadow of a doubt, there are innumerable failures in and by the West that have yet to be fully accounted for.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Knorf said:


> ...You'll never get a complete picture of Shostakovich the composer and the man without the string quartets. He himself said that the symphonies were for the public, and chamber music, especially string quartets, were for his most personal statements.
> 
> ...
> Shostakovich was literally forced at gun point to read public statements. There is photographic and video footage of some of this, and Shostakovich's demeanor is that of a hostage being forced to say what his captors wish. These public statements, always hugely supportive of the Soviet regime, were very obviously given under duress.
> ...


Listen to Shostakovich's First Symphony, and then to the First String Quartet. Go next to the Second Symphony, and then the Second String Quartet. Continue on likewise through the cycle of symphonies and quartets. The experience may prove revelatory.

I've done this recently. This virus quarantine is good for something.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Coach G said:


> ... and you probably wouldn't break out your Shostakovich records at a party.


Well ... I just might bring out the Tahiti Trot. Seems good party music to me. Anyhow, the audience in this performance isn't weeping, scowling, or throwing eggs. I can imagine them with martinis in hand, laughing and having a good time.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Coach G said:


> ...and you probably wouldn't break out your Shostakovich records at a party.


At the kind of parties I throw, Shostakovich is always welcome.


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## mparta (Sep 29, 2020)

Knorf said:


> This "Zhdanov" in the thread is certainly living up to his namesake...
> 
> One error this thread is making: focusing on the symphonies so much. You'll never get a complete picture of Shostakovich the composer and the man without the string quartets. He himself said that the symphonies were for the public, and chamber music, especially string quartets, were for his most personal statements.
> 
> ...


I think this is right about the quartets, but I also like to think as I posted above, about his general engagement with Russian whatever it is ism, anti-authoritarian and absurdist and pretty funny, thus i recommend the Nose. Makes for the case that some of the Soviet culture was present before the Soviets even showed up.


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## Merl (Jul 28, 2016)

Knorf said:


> At the kind of parties I throw, Shostakovich is always welcome.


*Merl reminds himself not to go to parties at Knorfy's. :lol:


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

Merl said:


> *Merl reminds himself not to go to parties at Knorfy's. :lol:


Lies. You _know_ you'd have a blast at my parties!


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## joen_cph (Jan 17, 2010)

The brief Scherzo for piano and orchestra op.7 is pretty party-like and social too.


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## Knorf (Jan 16, 2020)

joen_cph said:


> The brief Scherzo for piano and orchestra op.7 is pretty party-like too.


No question Shostakovich could write top-quality, joyful music. Consider the last movement of the Piano Concerto No. 1, the Piano Concerto No. 2 in general, the last movement of Symphonies 6 & 9, etc.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

joen_cph said:


> .. op.7 is pretty party-like and social too.


Face it. At the end of a really _great_ party, everybody looks like they've just come out of the Shostakovich 14th Symphony. Anybody want it any other way?


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## GucciManeIsTheNewWebern (Jul 29, 2020)

Knorf said:


> No question Shostakovich could write top-quality, joyful music. Consider the last movement of the Piano Concerto No. 1, the Piano Concerto No. 2 in general, the last movement of Symphonies 6 & 9, etc.


I definitely agree with this. While I'm not inside the composer's head and can't speak definitively on what he meant, I personally feel like I can distinguish between the sarcasm and the genuine happiness very easily. There's a lot of passages of sheer joy I've heard across his work.

In regards to the irony, I think taking something innocuous and unassuming and twisting it into something distorted and sinister is not just an attempt at subversion and expressing bitterness, but also getting some of his darker, complex psychological thoughts across. Corrupting happiness revealing inner psychological turmoil. But it's only speculation and how emotionally interpret the music not any authoritative statement on my part.


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