SACDs - Shostakovich

Shostakovich wrote two cello concertos for his great friend Mstislav Rostropovich.

Cello Concerto No. 1 was written in 1959, a difficult year for the composer. His second marriage was failing, and he was suffering from a debility in his right hand that hampered his ability to write, and to play the piano. His personal circumstances could not help but to colour this dark and uncompromising cello concerto. The angular motifs in the first movement grate against one another, and the slow movement touches depths of feeling unheard in Shostakovich’s works since the First Violin Concerto a decade earlier.

Shostakovich’s inspiration for the concerto was Prokofiev’s Symphony-Concerto for cello and orchestra. He loved this work, and told Rostropovich that he had played the recording of it so many times that it eventually wore out completely and only emitted a kind of hiss when he put it on his gramophone player.

Cello Concerto No. 2 was written seven years later, in 1966. It was premiered at the composer’s sixtieth birthday concert with Mstislav Rostropovich as soloist. Until the very last moment it was doubtful that Shostakovich himself would attend, as he had recently suffered a heart attack. In the end, he did make it to the concert, and both he and the new concerto were rapturously received. In the words of Rostropovich, this work is ‘less striking [than its predecessor]… but its profundity is second to none’.

The works are here performed by the cellist Enrico Dindo, whom Rostropovich himself described as ‘a cellist of exceptional qualities, a complete artist and a formed musician, with an extraordinary sound which flows as a splendid Italian voice’. Dindo has performed with the BBC Philharmonic, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Orchestre national de France, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, and Chicago Symphony Orchestra, among others, under conductors such as Valery Gergiev and Rostropovich. On this recording he is accompanied by the Danish National Symphony Orchestra under Gianandrea Noseda, an exclusive Chandos artist.

For the the third title in his Shostakovich symphony cycle, Valery Gergiev again couples two works from different stages in the composer’s career. Although Shostakovich’s symphonies are usually highly programmatic, the Third and Tenth Symphonies are amongst his most enigmatic works.

Symphony No. 3 was first performed in January 1930, its final movement setting a text by Semyon Isaakovich Kirsanov praising May Day and the revolution. Shostakovich stated that the work “expresses the spirit of peaceful reconstruction” and yet much of the music is dark and sombre in tone.

The Tenth Symphony is one of his most popular and frequently heard works. It was first performed in December 1953 following the death of Stalin, although Shostakovich had been working on much of the material incorporated in the symphony for many years. The great Russian soprano Galina Vishnevskaya claimed that the symphony was “a composer’s testament of misery, forever damning a tyrant.” Previous releases in Gergiev’s Shostakovich cycle include Symphonies Nos 2 & 11 and Symphonies Nos 1 & 15, the latter of which was nominated for two Grammy Awards. The Mariinsky label will release its second recording with pianist Denis Matsuev during May 2011 featuring Shostakovich’s piano concertos.

Gergiev’s recent releases on LSO Live have included Mahler’s Symphony No 5, an Outstanding Recording in International Record Review.

Dmitri Shostakovich's satirical opera The Nose was premièred in 1930 and set in St Petersburg. Based on a short story by Nikolai Gogol, its absurd plot revolves around the exploits of a pompous government official and his nose. After a visit to the barber, the nose absconds from the man's face and takes on a life of its own; the pretentious bureaucrat is reduced to desperation, frantically searching the city for his lost appendage. Although primarily a comic opera, The Nose touches on the struggle between the individual and society (here portrayed by a cast of over 80 characters), and its spiky score is a 1920's modernist masterpiece from the prodigiously talented young composer. Forthcoming releases from Mariinsky feature a broad cross-section of Russian music.Well known and rarely heard works by Tchaikovsky and Shostakovich will feature alongside the first recording of Rodion Shchedrin's opera The Enchanted Wanderer. 'Mariinsky' the label, will draw on the theatre's rich legacy and historical ties to the great Russian composers. It will showcase the extraordinary talent within the theatre and orchestra, presenting works that are both familiar and less well known, enabling listeners to enjoy exceptional performances from one of the greatest opera and ballet companies.The Mariinsky Theatre can trace its origins back to 1783 when Catherine the Great issued a decree that led to its formation. It has staged the premieres of operas by Verdi, Borodin, Mussorgsky and Tchaikovsky as well as many of the great ballets including Sleeping Beauty, The Nutcracker, La Bayadère and Raimonda. The company remains committed to presenting new opera and ballet, most recently Smelkov's The Brothers Karamazov and in 2009 will premiere three new mono- operas based on works by Gogol. Under the leadership of Valery Gergiev its international reputation has grown through frequent touring and recordings. It recently reverted to the Mariinsky name, having previously been known more widely by its Communist-era name of Kirov.

This CD presents music composed by Benjamin Britten and Dmitri Shostakovich, two striking personalities from recent 20th-century musical history, who were also united by an intimate friendship. They both also shared reciprocal friendship with the inspiring and energetic Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, who gave the premier of both the three Suites for cello by Britten solo and the Second Cello Concerto in G by Shostakovich.

Pieter Wispelwey recorded Shostakovich with the Sinfonietta Cracovia which ranks among the leading Polish and European orchestras. The exceptional atmosphere of their concerts, the enthusiastic reception by the audiences, glowing reviews and, first of all, the quality of stage performances are to confirm the sustainable development of the still young ensemble.

Wispelwey needs no further explanation. In 1990 his first recording with Channel Classics, the Bach Cello Suites, was released to great acclaim and in 1992 he was the first cellist ever to receive the Netherlands Music Prize, which is endowed upon the most promising young musician in the Netherlands; thus his path was secured to the busy and varied career he has today. Recently the latest release of Dvorak’s Cello Concerto with Budapest Festival Orchestra gave him, Channel Classics and Ivan Fischer and his BFO great reviews.

The penultimate release of MDG’s highly successful cycle of the symphonies of Shostakovich. In his Symphony No. 3 the twenty-three-year old composer paid homage to May First as an important symbol of the revolution; forty-two years later in his Symphony No.15 he seems to have wanted to recall the carefree years of his youth. As on the previous releases in this splendid series, Roman Kofman conducts the Beethoven Orchestra Bonn.