This week the Pytheas Center honors American composer Milton Babbitt, who died this week at the age of 94. Read about Babbitt's life and music in Allan Kozinn's obituary from The New York Times.
Then hear Milton Babbitt himself talk about his life and electronic music in this week's COMPOSER PORTRAIT.
And listen to two featured works by Babbitt. His Composition for 12 Instruments (1948/54) . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.
And Philomel (1964), composed for soprano and electonically synthesized sound . . . our FEATURED SOUND ART.
Aulis Sallinen is one of the most prominent figures in Finnish music, and his music often focuses on figures from Finnish history. While his lyric writing shows a strong Sibelius influence, there is also a certain acerbic touch in both his subject matter and his music that is strongly reminiscent of Prokofiev, Shostakovich and Weill. His opera The Red Line (1978), in particular, has a sardonic, slightly bitter tone that strongly resembles Shostakovich's Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. And like Kurt Weill, he also used jazz elements, as in the ironic song in in the opera Kullervo (1988) in which Kullervo learns that he has slept with his own sister. Hear a performance of Sallinen's Some Aspects of Peltoniemi Hintrik's Funeral March (1981), a work for string orchestra derived from his String Quartet No. 3 . . . one of our PYTHEAS EARFULS this week.
The instrumental and electroacoustic music of composer Alexandra Gardner combines explorations into the rich details of acoustic sound with a visceral percussive energy to create dynamic sonic landscapes. Drawing inspiration from sources ranging from mythology and contemporary poetry, to her training as a percussionist, Gardner is building new audiences for contemporary music with an expressive sound and a flair for the imaginative and unexpected. A native of Washington, DC, Gardner's compositions have been featured at festivals and venues throughout the U.S. and internationally. Watch a performance of her Bloom (2009) performed by cellist Joshua Roman . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Showing posts with label Shostakovich. Dmitri. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Shostakovich. Dmitri. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Paul Serotsky writes at MusicWeb International: "For Dmitri Shostakovich, 1953 to about 1960 was a period of relative prosperity and security: with Stalin's death a great curtain of fear had been lifted. Shostakovich was gradually restored to favour, allowed to earn a living, and even honoured, though there was a price . . . co-operation (at least ostensibly) with the authorities. The peak of this 'thaw', in 1956 when large numbers of 'rehabilitated' intellectuals were released, coincided with the composition of the effervescent Second Piano Concerto. Shostakovich's son, Maxim, gave the concerto its first performance on 10th May 1957, Maxim's 19th birthday. Shostakovich must have intended all along that this would be a 'birthday present' - for, while the composer remained covertly dissident (the Eleventh Symphony was just around the corner), the piano concerto is utterly devoid of all subterfuge, cryptic codes and hidden messages. Instead, it brims with youthful vigour, vitality, romance - and such sheer mischief that it may even have been a 'character study' of Maxim." Watch a performance of the first movement of Shostakovich’s Piano Conc. No. 2 (1957) with pianist Kirill Gerstein and the NHK Symphony Orchestra, Charles Dutoit, conducting . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.
Identity has always been at the center of Gabriela Lena Frank's music. Born in Berkeley, California, to a mother of mixed Peruvian/Chinese ancestry and a father of Lithuanian/Jewish descent, Frank explores her multicultural heritage most ardently through her compositions. She has traveled extensively throughout South America and her pieces reflect and refract her studies of Latin-American folklore, incorporating poetry, mythology, and native musical styles into a western classical framework that is uniquely her own. She writes challenging idiomatic parts for solo instrumentalists, vocalists, chamber ensembles, and orchestras. Moreover, Frank writes, "There's usually a story line behind my music; a scenario or character". Watch an interview of Gabriela Lena Frank with Frank J. Oteri (thanks to NewMusicBox) Composite Identity (NewMusicBox) . . . it's our COMPOSER PORTRAIT for the week.
Disillusioned by many aspects of the classical music establishment, Steve Martland has forged his own path, employing what he finds of value in the classical tradition, but also incorporating elements of jazz, folk, and rock into his energetic, dynamic music. He is also an active force in the field of music instruction, and has not been shy about speaking his mind on political issues. He worked with composer Louis Andriessen, whose music, combining minimalism and popular music styles, became something of a model for Martland when he was a young composer. He also studied with Gunther Schuller at the Berkshire Music Center as a composition fellow in 1984. Listen to a performance of Steve Martland’s Beat The Retreat (1995) . . . one of our PYTHEAS EARFULS this week.
The Concerto Macabre (1944/1972) from the film Hangover Square (1944) is Bernard Herrmann's only venture into film piano concertos. The film starred Laird Cregar as a mad composer who went on killing sprees whenever he heard loud noise. Through the concerto Herrmann generates a haunting impression of loneliness and death, and the work is a rare example of a piano concerto ending with just the solo piano. Hear a performance of the Concerto Macabre with pianist David Beuchner and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, with James Sedares conducting . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Identity has always been at the center of Gabriela Lena Frank's music. Born in Berkeley, California, to a mother of mixed Peruvian/Chinese ancestry and a father of Lithuanian/Jewish descent, Frank explores her multicultural heritage most ardently through her compositions. She has traveled extensively throughout South America and her pieces reflect and refract her studies of Latin-American folklore, incorporating poetry, mythology, and native musical styles into a western classical framework that is uniquely her own. She writes challenging idiomatic parts for solo instrumentalists, vocalists, chamber ensembles, and orchestras. Moreover, Frank writes, "There's usually a story line behind my music; a scenario or character". Watch an interview of Gabriela Lena Frank with Frank J. Oteri (thanks to NewMusicBox) Composite Identity (NewMusicBox) . . . it's our COMPOSER PORTRAIT for the week.
Disillusioned by many aspects of the classical music establishment, Steve Martland has forged his own path, employing what he finds of value in the classical tradition, but also incorporating elements of jazz, folk, and rock into his energetic, dynamic music. He is also an active force in the field of music instruction, and has not been shy about speaking his mind on political issues. He worked with composer Louis Andriessen, whose music, combining minimalism and popular music styles, became something of a model for Martland when he was a young composer. He also studied with Gunther Schuller at the Berkshire Music Center as a composition fellow in 1984. Listen to a performance of Steve Martland’s Beat The Retreat (1995) . . . one of our PYTHEAS EARFULS this week.
The Concerto Macabre (1944/1972) from the film Hangover Square (1944) is Bernard Herrmann's only venture into film piano concertos. The film starred Laird Cregar as a mad composer who went on killing sprees whenever he heard loud noise. Through the concerto Herrmann generates a haunting impression of loneliness and death, and the work is a rare example of a piano concerto ending with just the solo piano. Hear a performance of the Concerto Macabre with pianist David Beuchner and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, with James Sedares conducting . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Monday, July 19, 2010
Considering the singularity of Dmitri Shostakovich’s voice, it is no surprise to find a chamber music work like the Piano Trio No.2, op.67 (1944) clothed in his typical coat of many colors: somberness, simple folkishness, diabolical urgency, satirical stridency, anger. The somberness is particularly appropriate here, for the Trio No. 2 was composed in the summer of 1944 in memory of one of Shostakovich’s closest friends, Ivan Sollertinsky, who had died the February before. The tribute to his friend is not by any means all a maudlin affair, but bereavement is apparent in the first movement’s elegiac introduction, and, particularly, in a bleak third movement. -- from notes to the LA Philharmonic . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.
Michael Daugherty has created a niche in the music world that is uniquely his own, composing concert music inspired by American popular culture. He first came to international attention in the 1990s with a series of witty, dark-humored, brilliantly-scored pieces inspired by 20th-century American icons such as Superman, Jackie O, Elvis, J. Edgar Hoover, and Rosa Parks, and places such as Route 66, Niagara Falls, and Sunset Strip. With compositional originality and ingenuity to match his subject matter, Daugherty became one of America's most frequently performed and commissioned living composers. The London Times has described Daugherty as "a master icon-maker" and hailed his "maverick imagination, fearless structural sense and meticulous ear". His music has the uncanny knack of speaking everybody’s language at once while retaining the ability to surprise, move, stimulate, inspire and amuse. His idiom bears the stamp of classic modernism, with colliding tonalities and blocks of sound; at the same time, his melodies can be eloquent and stirring. Listen to Michael Daugherty talk about his life and music . . . it's this week's COMPOSER PORTRAIT.
While it’s true that Destination Moon kicked off the burst of sci-fi moviemaking activity that was among the most distinctive pop-cultural features of the 1950’s, that movie wasn’t quite the first one out of the gate. Mind you, it was the first one put into production, but you take certain risks when you make as big a deal of a movie in the works as Eagle-Lion did with Destination Moon - namely, that some rinky-dink independent is going to throw together a low-budget knockoff of your big, prestigious film, and get it out into the theaters while your project is still in post-production. Roger Corman is probably the most famous practitioner of this particular ploy, but he by no means invented it. Some five years before Corman had produced so much as a demo reel, Robert Lippert, the eponymous head of Lippert Studios, stole Destination Moon’s thunder by bringing Rocket Ship X-M to the screen almost before Eagle-Lion even knew what hit them. And if you believe the rumors, Lippert would have stolen more than just his competitor’s thunder; according to the gossip-mongers, the only reason the rocketship of this movie’s title fails to reach the moon as planned is because Eagle-Lion’s lawyers wrote producer/director/screenwriter Kurt Neumann some pissed-off letters. (Scott Ashlin/1000misspenthours.com). Watch Rocket Ship X-M (1950) with a score by Ferde Grofé (composer of the famous Grand Canyon Suite) . . . it's this week's PYTHEAS SIGHTING.
In addition to being one of Hungary's most well known composers, Zoltán Kodály was also a well respected and successful educator in the field of music. His veritable crusade to provide all young people with a sound basic musical education resulted in a great body of work for schools and choirs. He lectured, conducted, taught - often involving his advanced pupils as well. He published, wrote as a critic and laid the foundations for a universal musical education system where singing as a group activity ensures that children become musically literate, learn to co-operate and understand the need for verbal as well as musical communication. The Kodály Method is now his permanent legacy, used and respected world-wide where the value of producing musical literacy among the young is recognized. Kodály was one of this century’s true musical renaissance men. His many-sided interests musical, linguistic, folk and broadly cultural, and educational were all informed by the strong backbone of his ethnic consciousness. Much of his music is imbued with Hungarian folk idioms, though none sacrifices its musical integrity to it. Watch a performance of Kodály's Esti Dal (Evening Song) by the King's Singers . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Michael Daugherty has created a niche in the music world that is uniquely his own, composing concert music inspired by American popular culture. He first came to international attention in the 1990s with a series of witty, dark-humored, brilliantly-scored pieces inspired by 20th-century American icons such as Superman, Jackie O, Elvis, J. Edgar Hoover, and Rosa Parks, and places such as Route 66, Niagara Falls, and Sunset Strip. With compositional originality and ingenuity to match his subject matter, Daugherty became one of America's most frequently performed and commissioned living composers. The London Times has described Daugherty as "a master icon-maker" and hailed his "maverick imagination, fearless structural sense and meticulous ear". His music has the uncanny knack of speaking everybody’s language at once while retaining the ability to surprise, move, stimulate, inspire and amuse. His idiom bears the stamp of classic modernism, with colliding tonalities and blocks of sound; at the same time, his melodies can be eloquent and stirring. Listen to Michael Daugherty talk about his life and music . . . it's this week's COMPOSER PORTRAIT.
While it’s true that Destination Moon kicked off the burst of sci-fi moviemaking activity that was among the most distinctive pop-cultural features of the 1950’s, that movie wasn’t quite the first one out of the gate. Mind you, it was the first one put into production, but you take certain risks when you make as big a deal of a movie in the works as Eagle-Lion did with Destination Moon - namely, that some rinky-dink independent is going to throw together a low-budget knockoff of your big, prestigious film, and get it out into the theaters while your project is still in post-production. Roger Corman is probably the most famous practitioner of this particular ploy, but he by no means invented it. Some five years before Corman had produced so much as a demo reel, Robert Lippert, the eponymous head of Lippert Studios, stole Destination Moon’s thunder by bringing Rocket Ship X-M to the screen almost before Eagle-Lion even knew what hit them. And if you believe the rumors, Lippert would have stolen more than just his competitor’s thunder; according to the gossip-mongers, the only reason the rocketship of this movie’s title fails to reach the moon as planned is because Eagle-Lion’s lawyers wrote producer/director/screenwriter Kurt Neumann some pissed-off letters. (Scott Ashlin/1000misspenthours.com). Watch Rocket Ship X-M (1950) with a score by Ferde Grofé (composer of the famous Grand Canyon Suite) . . . it's this week's PYTHEAS SIGHTING.
In addition to being one of Hungary's most well known composers, Zoltán Kodály was also a well respected and successful educator in the field of music. His veritable crusade to provide all young people with a sound basic musical education resulted in a great body of work for schools and choirs. He lectured, conducted, taught - often involving his advanced pupils as well. He published, wrote as a critic and laid the foundations for a universal musical education system where singing as a group activity ensures that children become musically literate, learn to co-operate and understand the need for verbal as well as musical communication. The Kodály Method is now his permanent legacy, used and respected world-wide where the value of producing musical literacy among the young is recognized. Kodály was one of this century’s true musical renaissance men. His many-sided interests musical, linguistic, folk and broadly cultural, and educational were all informed by the strong backbone of his ethnic consciousness. Much of his music is imbued with Hungarian folk idioms, though none sacrifices its musical integrity to it. Watch a performance of Kodály's Esti Dal (Evening Song) by the King's Singers . . . this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Friday, October 2, 2009
The Lark Ascending (1920) is perhaps the most perfect work Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote for a solo instrument accompanied by orchestra. Finding inspiration not only in English folk tunes but also in a poem by the English poet George Meredith (1828-1909), Vaughan Williams' orchestral romance offers an impressionistic image of a lark's song and his beloved English countryside. The composer included a portion of Meredith's poem on the flyleaf of the published score:
He rises and begins to round,
He drops the silver chain of sound,
Of many links without a break,
In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake.
For singing till his heaven fills,
‘Tis love of earth that he instils,
And ever winging up and up,
Our valley is his golden cup
And he the wine which overflows
to lift us with him as he goes.
Till lost on his aerial rings
In light, and then the fancy sings.
Hear and watch a stunning performance of The Lark Ascending by violinist Janine Jansen . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.
Jugu Abraham, at Movies That Make You Think writes, "Time and again people have asked me which movie is my all time favorite. I have often said without much hesitation: King Lear (1971), by the Russian film maker Grigory Kozintsev. Even close friends wonder if I have lost my wits because they expect my favorite would be Orson Welles's Citizen Kane or a work of Tarkovsky, Kieslowski, or even Terrence Mallick, my favorite directors. I fell in love with the Ukranian-born director Kozintsev’s King Lear some 30 years ago and I continue to be enraptured by the black-and-white film shot in cinemascope each time I see it. Each time you view the film, one realizes that a creative genius can embellish another masterpiece from another medium by providing food for thought---much beyond what Shakespeare offered his audiences centuries ago". The sparce film score by Dmitri Shostakovich comes from last years of his life. Have a look ... this week's PYTHEAS SIGHTING.
American composer Christopher Rouse started out at as a rock & roll drummer. However, it was not long until his love for classical composing took over and he enrolled in the Oberlin Conservatory. Having received a degree in composition in 1971, he continued with graduate work at Cornell University. He has taught at the Eastman School of Music since 1981, began teaching composition at the Juilliard School in 1997 and became co-composer in residence at the Aspen Music Festival in 1999. In a successful career as a composer he has won many awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for his Trombone Concerto in 1993. Rouse is best known for his large body of concertos and symphonic works. He has been described as "the Stephen King of composition," since many of his works from the late 1980s and early 1990s dealt with issues of death, horror, tragedy, and mythology. Hear Rouse's 2007 talk with Chandler Branch of Soli Deo Gloria before the world premiere performance of his Requiem (2007) ... this week's COMPOSER PORTRAIT.
Toru Takemitsu's Rain Tree Sketch II (1992) was composed in memory of Oliver Messiaen. The name was probably inspired by a quotation from Kenzaburo Oe's story Atama no ii, Ame no Ki (An Ingenious Rain Tree): "It was named the 'rain tree', for its abundant foliage continued to let fall rain drops from the previous night's shower until the following midday. Its hundreds of thousands of tiny, finger-like leaves store up moisture, whereas other trees dry out at once." The work is a dreamy, moody meditation on the flow of life, built on half a dozen well chosen notes. Hear and watch a performance by pianist Vestard Shimkus ... this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
He rises and begins to round,
He drops the silver chain of sound,
Of many links without a break,
In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake.
For singing till his heaven fills,
‘Tis love of earth that he instils,
And ever winging up and up,
Our valley is his golden cup
And he the wine which overflows
to lift us with him as he goes.
Till lost on his aerial rings
In light, and then the fancy sings.
Hear and watch a stunning performance of The Lark Ascending by violinist Janine Jansen . . . one of this week's FEATURED NEW MUSIC VIDEOS.
Jugu Abraham, at Movies That Make You Think writes, "Time and again people have asked me which movie is my all time favorite. I have often said without much hesitation: King Lear (1971), by the Russian film maker Grigory Kozintsev. Even close friends wonder if I have lost my wits because they expect my favorite would be Orson Welles's Citizen Kane or a work of Tarkovsky, Kieslowski, or even Terrence Mallick, my favorite directors. I fell in love with the Ukranian-born director Kozintsev’s King Lear some 30 years ago and I continue to be enraptured by the black-and-white film shot in cinemascope each time I see it. Each time you view the film, one realizes that a creative genius can embellish another masterpiece from another medium by providing food for thought---much beyond what Shakespeare offered his audiences centuries ago". The sparce film score by Dmitri Shostakovich comes from last years of his life. Have a look ... this week's PYTHEAS SIGHTING.
American composer Christopher Rouse started out at as a rock & roll drummer. However, it was not long until his love for classical composing took over and he enrolled in the Oberlin Conservatory. Having received a degree in composition in 1971, he continued with graduate work at Cornell University. He has taught at the Eastman School of Music since 1981, began teaching composition at the Juilliard School in 1997 and became co-composer in residence at the Aspen Music Festival in 1999. In a successful career as a composer he has won many awards, including the Pulitzer Prize for his Trombone Concerto in 1993. Rouse is best known for his large body of concertos and symphonic works. He has been described as "the Stephen King of composition," since many of his works from the late 1980s and early 1990s dealt with issues of death, horror, tragedy, and mythology. Hear Rouse's 2007 talk with Chandler Branch of Soli Deo Gloria before the world premiere performance of his Requiem (2007) ... this week's COMPOSER PORTRAIT.
Toru Takemitsu's Rain Tree Sketch II (1992) was composed in memory of Oliver Messiaen. The name was probably inspired by a quotation from Kenzaburo Oe's story Atama no ii, Ame no Ki (An Ingenious Rain Tree): "It was named the 'rain tree', for its abundant foliage continued to let fall rain drops from the previous night's shower until the following midday. Its hundreds of thousands of tiny, finger-like leaves store up moisture, whereas other trees dry out at once." The work is a dreamy, moody meditation on the flow of life, built on half a dozen well chosen notes. Hear and watch a performance by pianist Vestard Shimkus ... this week's FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pytheas Center for Contemporary Music
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Sofia Gubaidulina's Viola Concerto (1996) is the Featured New Music Video this week at Pytheas. Raymond Tuttle writes, "Gubaidulina is the greatest Russian composer at work today – the greatest since Shostakovich. Any new work from her is a major event, and the Viola Concerto is not a disappointment. The concerto's opening, with the soloist's insistence on the notes D and Eb, almost literally invokes the name of Dmitri Shostakovich, a formative influence on Gubaidulina. The violist and the orchestra share the concerto's sound-world with a string quartet, tuned a quarter-tone lower; a darker "second dimension" in the words of the composer. Here again, the violist travels between and mediates for the two ensembles. The concerto's tone is dark and oppressive, but Gubaidulina's need to communicate with her listeners is unmistakable. She demands their uttermost concentration, but those who make the effort are rewarded by being taken on an emotional journey whose aftereffects are long-lasting and deep".
Pulitzer Prize winning composer Paul Moravec has written more than a hundred orchestral, chamber, choral, lyric, film, and operatic works. His music has earned numerous other distinctions, including the Rome Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Rome, as well as many prestigious commissions. In many ways, Moravec's work builds upon "The Great Tradition" of Western Europe, reconfiguring some of its bedrock gestures into an aesthetic that is thoroughly of our day. Dubbed a New Tonalist by critic Terry Teachout, Moravec writes with depth but does so with a light touch. He draws on craftsmanship so virtuosic it seems easy. All this adds up to a composer who is simultaneously learned and accessible, tradition-based and imaginative, profound and a heck of a lot of fun. In an era when pundits worry over the fate of the concert world as a whole, Moravec's music-and its deep-down integrity-speak of confidence and hope. Listen to Moravec talk about his life and music in this week's Composer Portrait.
This week's Pytheas Earful brings us music from Massachusetts based composer Dean Rosenthal. Featured are his Songs from the Japanese (2000) for soprano and violin.
FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES brings Julian Bream's soulful and compelling performance of Manuel de Falla's Homage: The Tomb of Debussy (1920).
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Pulitzer Prize winning composer Paul Moravec has written more than a hundred orchestral, chamber, choral, lyric, film, and operatic works. His music has earned numerous other distinctions, including the Rome Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Rome, as well as many prestigious commissions. In many ways, Moravec's work builds upon "The Great Tradition" of Western Europe, reconfiguring some of its bedrock gestures into an aesthetic that is thoroughly of our day. Dubbed a New Tonalist by critic Terry Teachout, Moravec writes with depth but does so with a light touch. He draws on craftsmanship so virtuosic it seems easy. All this adds up to a composer who is simultaneously learned and accessible, tradition-based and imaginative, profound and a heck of a lot of fun. In an era when pundits worry over the fate of the concert world as a whole, Moravec's music-and its deep-down integrity-speak of confidence and hope. Listen to Moravec talk about his life and music in this week's Composer Portrait.
This week's Pytheas Earful brings us music from Massachusetts based composer Dean Rosenthal. Featured are his Songs from the Japanese (2000) for soprano and violin.
FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES brings Julian Bream's soulful and compelling performance of Manuel de Falla's Homage: The Tomb of Debussy (1920).
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Dmitri Shostakovich lived through a dark and tumultuous period in the history of the former Soviet Union. Because of this, or perhaps, in spite of this, he left us an amazingly diverse and rich body of works that resonate deeply to this day. This week at Pytheas we feature a performance of the thrilling fourth movement from his Symphony No. 5 in D minor, op. 47, written in 1937. According to Geoff Kuenning, "The late 1930's were not a good time for Dmitri Shostakovich. His successful opera, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, was banned after Stalin saw it in 1936 and was offended by its veiled criticism of the Communist regime. This was no small matter; most who drew the dictator's wrath soon died in a labor camp. Shostakovich was luckier, perhaps because the young composer had already achieved some international recognition, but the attacks in Pravda turned him into a pariah who began keeping a packed suitcase beside his bed in case he were arrested in the night. Meanwhile, Russia was undergoing what would later be called the "Great Terror", a period of repression rarely seen in human history. In such an atmosphere, and with a wife and two young children to worry about, it was only natural that Shostakovich would pull his head back into his shell and try to please the authorities. And so he did, at least on the surface: the Fifth Symphony's subtitle is "A Soviet Artist's Practical Creative Reply to Just Criticism." But throughout history, artists have thumbed their noses at authorities who were too dense to see through their parody and satire, and Shostakovich was no different." Of the fourth movement, Shostakovich wrote in his memoirs: "What exultation could there be? I think it is clear to everyone what happens in the Fifth. The rejoicing is forced, created under 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, shaky, and go marching off, muttering, 'Our business is rejoicing, our business is rejoicing.' What kind of apotheosis is that? You have to be a complete oaf not to hear that."
Shostakovich is also the subject of this week's Featured Thought and Idea: The Fight for Shostakovich by Norman Lebrecht (La Scene Musicale).
This week's Featured Recording - Leroy Anderson: Orchestral Music, Volume 1 (Naxos) - brings us music from American composer Leroy Anderson, who has been called "the most famous unknown composer". His most famous works (in particular, the perennial Christmas favorite "Sleighride) have become part of the American musical landscape, bringing joy and pleasure to a wide, wide audience.
FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES brings us music from one of the most famous living composers - John Williams. Not "Star Wars", Indiana Jones", "Gilligan's Island", "Lost in Space", "Jaws", "E.T.", "Schindler's List", "Harry Potter", but ... Soundings written in 2003 for the opening of Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
Shostakovich is also the subject of this week's Featured Thought and Idea: The Fight for Shostakovich by Norman Lebrecht (La Scene Musicale).
This week's Featured Recording - Leroy Anderson: Orchestral Music, Volume 1 (Naxos) - brings us music from American composer Leroy Anderson, who has been called "the most famous unknown composer". His most famous works (in particular, the perennial Christmas favorite "Sleighride) have become part of the American musical landscape, bringing joy and pleasure to a wide, wide audience.
FROM THE PYTHEAS ARCHIVES brings us music from one of the most famous living composers - John Williams. Not "Star Wars", Indiana Jones", "Gilligan's Island", "Lost in Space", "Jaws", "E.T.", "Schindler's List", "Harry Potter", but ... Soundings written in 2003 for the opening of Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.
Explore, Listen and Enjoy!
Vinny Fuerst
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