Shostakovich

This week I am at All-State Orchestra. One of the pieces we are playing is Shostakovitch's Symphony Number 5. Today's blog post is going to be about why Shostakovitch is an uber-genius.

Dmitri Shostakovitch lived his whole life in Russia. At this time, Russia was a socialist regime ruled by Stalin. As you may have heard, Stalin was not a very friendly guy. Due to his extreme idea of nationalism, there was intense censorship across the cultural spectrum. Stalin heard some of Shostakovitch's early music and deemed it to be upsetting to Russian ideals. While this may not seem like a big deal, at this team, people that upset Russian ideals tended to dissapear rapidly with the aid of the KGB. Shostakovitch became deathly afraid of this fate, and was so paranoid that, when he finished his Symphony No. 4, he refused to let it be premiered in case Stalin did not approve. So what did Shostakovitch do? Wimp out and become a factory worker? No. He wrote one of the greatest works of art ever. Shostakovitch's Symphony No. 5 is freaking amazing. Allow me to explain why.

The whole piece has a very patriotic feel to it- the battle march sections and blaring brass seem to show a real pride in Mother Russia. However, his music goes much deeper than this. Beneath a facade of nationalism lies a sarcastic, angry, scared view of his circumstances. For example, in the first movement, there are many times when the whole orchestra stops and there are three solid individual chords. These chords are harsh and sharp. They are meant to represent the KGB knocking on Shostakovitch's door, an event which he was constantly paranoid about. Another example is the end of the fourth movement. The last two minutes of music consist of a loud brass chorale, which seems very happy and proud. However, the whole section is underscored by the entire string section playing an A. With the same rhythm. Over and over. For two minutes. This is meant to represent how this happiness that Russians supposedly feel towards their leader is strained, forced, and fake.

The reason Shostakovitch is such a bamf is because he was able to write one of the most beautiful pieces of music ever (I didn't mention the 3rd movement- absolutely stunning), and make relevant and active political commentary at the same time. A man with this talent is nothing short of a genius.

I'm attaching two links to this- one is for the fourth movement of his symphony, where you can hear the blaring A's at the end. The other link is to the second movement of his second piano concerto. I know I didn't talk about this at all, but, in my opinion, it is one of the most beautiful works ever, and I highly recommend you listening to it.