# Symphony no 9. Shostakovich



## Judith (Nov 11, 2015)

Don't know if Shostakovich had meant for it to be like this but here is my take on this symphony. Don't know if I have got this right or not!! What is everyone else's opinion on this symphony?

Movement 1
Very jolly as happiness that the war is over

Movement 2
Sadness as family & friends lost

Movement 3
Sounds like the soldiers are marching in rows, maybe a drill

Movement 4
Trumpets were calling to mark the end of the war

Movement 5
Straight into this movement showing that life goes on after this war


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

The usual story is that Stalin and the Soviet bosses were expecting Shostakovich to complete a grand wartime trilogy = Syms 7,8,9 - with 9 being the great paean of victory of the Soviet people. But DS had other ideas, ans produced this wonderful , Haydn-esque symphony, which is loaded with humor, and musical jokes, albeit with a darker undertone.
The first mvt is indeed playful, quirky, with deliberate extra beats, trombone blats, etc... the 2nd mvt is really quite beautiful - and here, I prefer a slower tempo than Shostakovich indicated - Kurz/NYPO makes a convincing case for this....mvt 3 is the scherzo, a typical DS romp, that leads straight into the 4th mvt...a wonderful solo for bassoon - quasi recitando. over hushed strings, between the brass fanfares. this leads straight into the finale, which takes the opening tune to a rollicking finale...
As a bassoon player, this is a favorite piece of mine - where else does the bassoon get a whole mvt to itself??  
I've played it several times, and it is most rewarding...this symphony presents many challenging solos for the orchestra - it is a great showpiece....
in no way is #9 a lightweight throwaway tho, it is a very solid work...it might not of been the great hymn to victory that was anticipated, but nobody could ever accuse DS of lacking a sense of humor.


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

in no way is #9 a lightweight throwaway tho, 

No indeed. I suspect this is a darker Symphony than is sometimes credited.

Interesting though, that Shostakovich did actually try and produce the big hymn to victory expected of him. The sketches have been recorded on Naxos. It just wouldn't work for him as a composer, and he abandoned his original plans, producing this - affirmation that despite the war, despite the terrors, humour, the little man, and the human spirit, all survived. It's like a little green shoot protruding from the ash in the weeks after a huge volcanic eruption.


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## Guest (Jan 30, 2018)

If you can access this, you may find it interesting...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01ytbc6


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

This is a deceptive symphony - despite its up front circus atmosphere, there are indeed very dark undercurrents. The plaintive bassoon solo in the 4th movement should be (if the player is up to it) a deeply troubling, sad, thought provoking statement. The are deep and profound things going on is this symphony - exactly what the composer intended. It is one of my favorite works he wrote. There are many fine recordings, but for me Leonard Bernstein "got it" better than anyone ever. Essential listening. It's also one of those symphonies that is aggravatingly underperformed.


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## Boston Charlie (Dec 6, 2017)

I heard Leonard Bernstein refer to Shostakovich's 9th as an anti-9th. Where Beethoven, Schubert, Dvorak, Bruckner and Mahler aspire to great heights while making their final statement, Shostakovich opts for something quite different. I think that the genius of the Shostakovich's 9th is that it is both light and heavy at the same time. If I may make a comparison to Prokofiev's "Classical Symphony" where the composers pays homage to Haydn with something that is light, airy and joyful; Shostakovich's attempt at "lightness" carries with it an underlying sense of anxiety, sadness, sarcasm, anger and such.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I've never understood how Shostakovich, a Kapellmeister for a dictatorial regime, thought he could get away with a symphony like the 9th after a tremendously hard-fought victory in a great war that cost 20 million Soviet lives. Even in the US it drew criticism: "The Russian composer should not have expressed his feelings about the defeat of Nazism in such a childish manner." (New York World-Telegram, 27 July 1946)

The work was banned in the Soviet Union officially in 1948 and removed from the banned list in 1955.

That said, it's certainly an engaging and entertaining work.


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## kyjo (Jan 1, 2018)

I love Shostakovich's 9th! It's often wrongly dismissed as a "lightweight" piece, and while the fast movements are great fun, the two slow movements have a haunting, despairing quality. There's not a single dull moment in the whole piece!


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

kyjo said:


> I love Shostakovich's 9th! It's often wrongly dismissed as a "lightweight" piece, and while the fast movements are great fun, the two slow movements have a haunting, despairing quality. There's not a single dull moment in the whole piece!


Well said - yes, Shost #9 is a most interesting work....lots of humor, but lots of inner mystery and darkness as well... I esp like the 2nd mvt at a slow tempo - slower than DS's markings...Efrem Kurtz made a convincing case for this in his wonderful 1947 NYPO recording [still the best, IMO]...first time I played it was with Walter Hendl - and he took it at a similarly slow pace, and it was mighty effective....very haunting and beautiful...


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## znapschatz (Feb 28, 2016)

I just love how so many here who have posted "gets" the Shostakovich 9th. Bravo to this community!


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## philoctetes (Jun 15, 2017)

Heard Gergiev and the Mariinsky do this back in November, and it won over my typically skeptical attitude about Dmitri. The bassoon solo was the highlight of the night.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Wonderful symphony. Nice contrast to the monsters that came before it!


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## Guest (Feb 2, 2018)

KenOC said:


> I've never understood how Shostakovich, a Kapellmeister for a dictatorial regime, thought he could get away with a symphony like the 9th after a tremendously hard-fought victory in a great war that cost 20 million Soviet lives.


Because the 7th had already "celebrated" - what need was there to write another?


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

MacLeod said:


> Because the 7th had already "celebrated" - what need was there to write another?


Evidently others felt differently!


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

MacLeod said:


> Because the 7th had already "celebrated" - what need was there to write another?


but #8 is hardly celebratory it is certainly a powerful "wartime" symphony - but definitely the dark side of the whole sordid business...not much to celebrate in #8.


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

Heck148 said:


> but #8 is hardly celebratory it is certainly a powerful "wartime" symphony - but definitely the dark side of the whole sordid business...not much to celebrate in #8.


Agreed. No. 8 strikes me as being more tragic than heroic - after all, by the time the symphony was written the grim blockade of Shostakovich's birthplace which had been in place for nearly two terrible years still had six months to run irrespective of the fact that the tide was beginning to turn elsewhere. Perhaps no. 9 on the surface reflects immediate relief that the conflict is over but the enigmatic nature of the work overall masks a deeper feeling of uncertain times ahead. Of course, Shostakovich being the composer he was it could well be nothing to do with any of this at all.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

Heck148 said:


> Well said - yes, Shost #9 is a most interesting work....lots of humor, but lots of inner mystery and darkness as well... I esp like the 2nd mvt at a slow tempo - slower than DS's markings...Efrem Kurtz made a convincing case for this in his wonderful 1947 NYPO recording [still the best, IMO]...first time I played it was with Walter Hendl - and he took it at a similarly slow pace, and it was mighty effective....very haunting and beautiful...


For an interesting and rather unexpected recorded version, there is a 1956 recording of the 9th with the Turin RAI Symphony Orchestra conducted by .... Otto Klemperer! As this was from only about 1 year after the work was un-banned, there was little interpretive precedent at the time.

P.S. The set also includes Stravinsky's _Pulcinella_


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Don't be surprised by Klemperer doing this. He was actually quite involved with new, revolutionary music most of his life. At the Kroll opera, composer like Krenek, Weill, Schulhoff were frequently done by Otto. It wasn't until his Indian Summer in London that he got branded a conductor of the Beethoven, Brahms, Mahler school that most people associate him with. He was a very versatile conductor, much more so than say Bruno Walter.


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## Becca (Feb 5, 2015)

I am not at all surprised by his broad repertoire and am familiar with some of his 1930's work in Los Angeles but this is the first that I have come across him doing Shostakovich.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

Heck148 said:


> The usual story is that Stalin and the Soviet bosses were expecting Shostakovich to complete a grand wartime trilogy = Syms 7,8,9 - with 9 being the great paean of victory of the Soviet people. But DS had other ideas, ans produced this wonderful , Haydn-esque symphony, which is loaded with humor, and musical jokes, albeit with a darker undertone.
> The first mvt is indeed playful, quirky, with deliberate extra beats, trombone blats, etc... the 2nd mvt is really quite beautiful - and here, I prefer a slower tempo than Shostakovich indicated - Kurz/NYPO makes a convincing case for this....mvt 3 is the scherzo, a typical DS romp, that leads straight into the 4th mvt...a wonderful solo for bassoon - quasi recitando. over hushed strings, between the brass fanfares. this leads straight into the finale, which takes the opening tune to a rollicking finale...
> As a bassoon player, this is a favorite piece of mine - where else does the bassoon get a whole mvt to itself??
> I've played it several times, and it is most rewarding...this symphony presents many challenging solos for the orchestra - it is a great showpiece....
> in no way is #9 a lightweight throwaway tho, it is a very solid work...it might not of been the great hymn to victory that was anticipated, *but nobody could ever accuse DS of lacking a sense of humor.*


Re: that final line ... Perhaps Stalin would. I don't believe _he_ found _anything_ comical about that Ninth.


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## Heck148 (Oct 27, 2016)

SONNET CLV said:


> Re: that final line ... Perhaps Stalin would. I don't believe _he_ found _anything_ comical about that Ninth.


I think DS shows a lot of humor in Symphony #9....tho his Sense of humor is can be quite sardonic...the jokes are somewhat subtle, but not so much - extra beats, intentional "wrong" notes, an apparent "lightness" of texture as opposed to a heavy, grand "9th symphony" statement of musical apotheosis which may well have been expected...


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