Stephen McBride ([email protected])
Sat, 23 Jan 1999 11:50:23 -0000
After Stalin damning the opera "Lady Macbeth of the Mtensk
district" as "chaos, not music", Shostakovich withdrew publication
of the 4th Symphony which he had been correcting. He rewrote
the opera, and then the 5th Symphony, with its mournful first three
movements, and celebratory fourth. Which Shostakovich
described as forced celebration at gunpoint. He subtitled the 5th a
"A Soviet Artist's reponce to Just Criticism".
The 8th was written, and performed whilst the Nazis were besieging
Leningrad, and was smuggled out to the west via Teheran. The
10th was Shostakovich's revenge, written after Stalin's death, and
also the death of Zhdanov, Stalin's artisic censor. In the music he
depicts Stalin as the raging maniac he was - and all Russians
would have understood this exactly in the music.
A fine artist, and one who still believed in the revolution, until his
death in 1975, despite what occured during the 1930's. Sort of
puts Bono's "political" posturings in perspective!! Because if any of
us had lived in Stalin's Soviet Union, we would, through
indoctrination and fear have towed the line, I can assure you!
Stephen
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
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