Many thanks again, David, for taking us through the 13th, Shostakovich's toughest Symphony, certainly one of his greatest.. The ending is extraordinary and so personal, daring to refer to what amounted to a lethal dilema in Stalin's Russia - to tell the truth or follow the party line (in order to live, have à career and feed the family).There's none of the familiar dubious triumphalism or resigned melancholy, but a subtle and haunting evocation of the artist's desire (and duty) to speak truth to power for that's all he can and must do.There's no inflated, tub-thumping that that's what he will always do. But it does come at the end of a work that does just that. I have an early recording of a live 1970 performance under Muti finely sung by Ruggero Raimondi. It's a testament to his affinity to the work (how many conductors recorded it twice?) The Italian orchestra plays almost tentatively at first, as if nervous of the piece, but by the end it becomes very moving, as if the performers are discovering how powerful this relatively new work is just as they perform it for the first time. Maybe it was the first performance in Italy.
Dave - thanks for this! If ever there was a time for this piece - written for the ages - it is now; right now! I have the Haitink and the Barshai - so sorry he wasted his gifts in my home town (Vancouver). Also had the privilege of hearing Muti live with the CSO. Multi has a very high, earnest view of the moral and spiritual possibilities inherent in music. He wears it with humility: and it confers on him a certain authority. And thanks to you for making music matter. A great support to all of us who can’t imagine life without it!
I already had the Kondrashin, Haitink, Rostropovich, Petrenko sets and bought this after Dave first mentioned the "Death" quality of the recording - and, indeed, he was right! Then I discovered the Kondrashin recording that was done on 20. Dec. 1962, 2 days after the premiere - available with surprisingly good sonics at Praga Digitals - and now I'm sold on this one. To add a very special experience: Teodor Currentzis, who opened his last season with the SWR Orchestra performing Babi Yar, did something I will never forget and now "see" every time I listen to the 13th since that moment: at the start of the violin/viola duet ending the last movement (at [156] in the score) he lets the solo viola change places with the violin next to the concert master, and this brought a kind of intimacy to that duet that moved me to tears.
Bought the whole set used and very cheap some time ago. As it is the case with lots of other stuff bought on behalf of this channel it's still waiting for me to actually make use of it and listen to the music.
That box was the first Shostakovich I owned, because the shop I worked in as a 17-year-old (which was the British equivalent of an American 7-Eleven) had a tiny discount CD rack, full of weird stuff, opposite the tills. Among the Mario Lanza and Tom Jones, this turned up, and I got it for a few pounds. I also got my first Grieg Piano Concerto from the Rack of Weirdness - Julius Katchen, Israel Philharmonic, Kertesz.
I got the Caballé/Davis Tosca in a similar way at a thrift store called Grant's when I was a kid. There it was, the only classical album in a sea of low-budget pop titles. How it got there is anyone's guess.
I remember the Kondrashin version on Everest. It was the first version available in the UK. The raw and rough recording almost enhanced the listening experience. Haunting, disturbing and yet compelling.
Excellent presentation Dave, on an excellent masterpiece, expressed as only Shostakovich could. I have that very Barshai box, and it is all magnificent.
I just had my first listening of this work and recording and can testify of its exceptional depth and broadness of scope. Sometimes, I feel new music lack of these. Of course, it is not new music except for your servant. I feel the way the finale seems to address the previous movements, in sound and form, especially the first makes it worthy of Beethoven's 9 th, one who would have known our times. I hope not to be too presumptuous and shallow, though this is a first approach and that I can still relisten and think with the help of your analysis and writings, among others. Thank you for allowing this almost first step.
I was just playing this performance yesterday and thinking that this is the closest I've heard to a continuation of his operatic career after Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. It has musical similarities which you find nowhere else in his work.
I’m not always in the mood for Shostakovich, so he’s one of those composers where I’m quite content with the recordings I have. This Barshsai set is excellent - surely it must be one of Brilliant Classics’ greatest successes. I also have Petrenko’s box, have heard the Haitink, and there are various singleton performances around here with the RCO, Karajan’s 10th, Markevich and Solti in the First etc. So I’m all set I think, and this is a remarkable 13th yes.
I love the tam-tam sound in this Barshai - WDR cycle. I do not know what brand the instrument was but everyone should use that one. I use the opening of the 4th movement of the 8th symphony as a ringtone, it always scares everyone around 🙂
When I started collecting Shostokovich symphonies back in the 70s I bought the Kondrashin recording on HMV/Melodiya (a 1972 recording). Not sure how many other Babi Yars were around back then. On CD I have the Haitink recording. Christmas is coming so I may treat myself to the Barshai box.
I wonder whether Shostakovich's Babi Yar is a nod in the direction of Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde, both structurally (a symphony comprised of orchestrated poems) and thematically?
@@hamidrezahabibi8111 I posted a link here in response to you, but it’s gone now, so either Dave or TH-cam removed it. 😛 Where else may I try sending you the link?
A small point given they were friends: the haunting end of the symphony, one strike of the bell, reminds me of the last note in Peter Grimes, a single, quiet strike on a cymbal.
Listening to this work and many others by Shostakovich, I often have the cruel thought that we, modern listeners, have benefited from the fact that he lived under Stalin's terrible dictatorship.
No! I often think he would have been a better composer had he not lived under Stalin and even if that’s not so one man( among so many millions)suffering isn’t worth it.
Without that malign factor, I think we would have had more operas from DSCH on the level of the two he wrote. But would we have had a 5th symphony, etc? Who knows.
Thanks! For my taste, the 4th from this box is also one of the most outstanding performances of this symphony (in my opinion, even the best one).
Many thanks again, David, for taking us through the 13th, Shostakovich's toughest Symphony, certainly one of his greatest.. The ending is extraordinary and so personal, daring to refer to what amounted to a lethal dilema in Stalin's Russia - to tell the truth or follow the party line (in order to live, have à career and feed the family).There's none of the familiar dubious triumphalism or resigned melancholy, but a subtle and haunting evocation of the artist's desire (and duty) to speak truth to power for that's all he can and must do.There's no inflated, tub-thumping that that's what he will always do. But it does come at the end of a work that does just that.
I have an early recording of a live 1970 performance under Muti finely sung by Ruggero Raimondi. It's a testament to his affinity to the work (how many conductors recorded it twice?) The Italian orchestra plays almost tentatively at first, as if nervous of the piece, but by the end it becomes very moving, as if the performers are discovering how powerful this relatively new work is just as they perform it for the first time. Maybe it was the first performance in Italy.
Dave - thanks for this! If ever there was a time for this piece - written for the ages - it is now; right now! I have the Haitink and the Barshai - so sorry he wasted his gifts in my home town (Vancouver). Also had the privilege of hearing Muti live with the CSO. Multi has a very high, earnest view of the moral and spiritual possibilities inherent in music. He wears it with humility: and it confers on him a certain authority.
And thanks to you for making music matter. A great support to all of us who can’t imagine life without it!
Couldn't agree more. Barshai set is a must have/listen
I bought this set, based on your recommendation and it is my "go to" for any of the symphonies.
I already had the Kondrashin, Haitink, Rostropovich, Petrenko sets and bought this after Dave first mentioned the "Death" quality of the recording - and, indeed, he was right! Then I discovered the Kondrashin recording that was done on 20. Dec. 1962, 2 days after the premiere - available with surprisingly good sonics at Praga Digitals - and now I'm sold on this one. To add a very special experience: Teodor Currentzis, who opened his last season with the SWR Orchestra performing Babi Yar, did something I will never forget and now "see" every time I listen to the 13th since that moment: at the start of the violin/viola duet ending the last movement (at [156] in the score) he lets the solo viola change places with the violin next to the concert master, and this brought a kind of intimacy to that duet that moved me to tears.
I regard No. 13 as Shostakovich's Magnum Opus!
Bought the whole set used and very cheap some time ago. As it is the case with lots of other stuff bought on behalf of this channel it's still waiting for me to actually make use of it and listen to the music.
Agreed on all points
That box was the first Shostakovich I owned, because the shop I worked in as a 17-year-old (which was the British equivalent of an American 7-Eleven) had a tiny discount CD rack, full of weird stuff, opposite the tills. Among the Mario Lanza and Tom Jones, this turned up, and I got it for a few pounds. I also got my first Grieg Piano Concerto from the Rack of Weirdness - Julius Katchen, Israel Philharmonic, Kertesz.
I got the Caballé/Davis Tosca in a similar way at a thrift store called Grant's when I was a kid. There it was, the only classical album in a sea of low-budget pop titles. How it got there is anyone's guess.
I remember the Kondrashin version on Everest. It was the first version available in the UK. The raw and rough recording almost enhanced the listening experience. Haunting, disturbing and yet compelling.
I believe that had the "expurgated" text-- of little importance if one doesn't speak Russian.
Yes, you are right. Mravinsky decided not to conduct it. We can speculate about the reason for this…… Kondrashin was a great Shostakovich interpreter
Agree. I have the box as my Shostakovich cycle and Haitink’s 13th as a supplement. Powerful music and a well-considered pick for our times.
My one and only set of Shostakovich symphonies, bought for it price but turns out to be amazing!
Excellent presentation Dave, on an excellent masterpiece, expressed as only Shostakovich could. I have that very Barshai box, and it is all magnificent.
Fully agree on everything you said! Great!
I just had my first listening of this work and recording and can testify of its exceptional depth and broadness of scope. Sometimes, I feel new music lack of these. Of course, it is not new music except for your servant. I feel the way the finale seems to address the previous movements, in sound and form, especially the first makes it worthy of Beethoven's 9 th, one who would have known our times. I hope not to be too presumptuous and shallow, though this is a first approach and that I can still relisten and think with the help of your analysis and writings, among others. Thank you for allowing this almost first step.
Thank YOU for taking the plunge!
I was just playing this performance yesterday and thinking that this is the closest I've heard to a continuation of his operatic career after Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. It has musical similarities which you find nowhere else in his work.
thanks ,. nice commentary,.
I’m not always in the mood for Shostakovich, so he’s one of those composers where I’m quite content with the recordings I have. This Barshsai set is excellent - surely it must be one of Brilliant Classics’ greatest successes. I also have Petrenko’s box, have heard the Haitink, and there are various singleton performances around here with the RCO, Karajan’s 10th, Markevich and Solti in the First etc. So I’m all set I think, and this is a remarkable 13th yes.
I love the tam-tam sound in this Barshai - WDR cycle. I do not know what brand the instrument was but everyone should use that one. I use the opening of the 4th movement of the 8th symphony as a ringtone, it always scares everyone around 🙂
Perfect 🙂
When I started collecting Shostokovich symphonies back in the 70s I bought the Kondrashin recording on HMV/Melodiya (a 1972 recording). Not sure how many other Babi Yars were around back then. On CD I have the Haitink recording. Christmas is coming so I may treat myself to the Barshai box.
The box I have. I am pleased with it, for sure. Did Ormandy do the premier recording of Babi Yar?
I wonder whether Shostakovich's Babi Yar is a nod in the direction of Mahler's Das Lied von der Erde, both structurally (a symphony comprised of orchestrated poems) and thematically?
No, that would be the 14th.
I think you can say it is about both the 13th and 14th.
Unfortunately it’s not available on Apple Music 🎶
When you look for Shostakovich Barshai, the complete symphonies box should be there.
@@Godbluffer please send me the link
@@hamidrezahabibi8111 I posted a link here in response to you, but it’s gone now, so either Dave or TH-cam removed it. 😛 Where else may I try sending you the link?
A small point given they were friends: the haunting end of the symphony, one strike of the bell, reminds me of the last note in Peter Grimes, a single, quiet strike on a cymbal.
Peter Grimes does not end with a cymbal stroke.
@@DavesClassicalGuide True, but I thought it did and didn't check first. My bad. Nice thought though!
Listening to this work and many others by Shostakovich, I often have the cruel thought that we, modern listeners, have benefited from the fact that he lived under Stalin's terrible dictatorship.
No! I often think he would have been a better composer had he not lived under Stalin and even if that’s not so one man( among so many millions)suffering isn’t worth it.
Without that malign factor, I think we would have had more operas from DSCH on the level of the two he wrote. But would we have had a 5th symphony, etc? Who knows.