There is a live performance of this on the radio this evening, Truls Mörk playing with the Orchestre de Paris, Eschenbach conducting.  The interpretation has no life at all, plodding, almost pointless. It almost gives the impression of badly conducted Benjamin Britten.  Romy can you suggest a performance of this piece I should listen too? 

Rony,

Shostakovich all-together is not a composer that I particularly care (beside his string quartets). Shostakovich did have a number of accidentally successful works but very few (as far as I concern).  I really do not remember the work you are asking. It is a Second concerto… I remember the First one (Ormandy with Rostropovich) and I remember that it was very very very poor.

Her is link that might help you to pick what you might like:

http://home.wanadoo.nl/ovar/shopuscd/op126.htm

However, I do not anticipate that it will be different from anything else he composed in 60s or whenever…

The Cat

As I told, I’m generally not a fan of the Shostakovich’s orchestral music. There is in Shostakovich’s “large music” a constant sense of vulgarity, peasant intellectualism, humiliation and a sense of blown-up meaningless artificial musicality that very aggressively turn me off.

It is hard to talk with western listeners about Shostakovich as they are mostly completely brainwashed about Shostakovich by the western propaganda and by the Eastern prostitution (courtesy to Mr. Volkov and many other). They, the western listeners, generally nave no idea about the Shostakovich’s realty and as soon one begin to question some purely musical values of Shostakovich’s symphonic compositions they instantly begun to sing their funny songs-excuses about the phony totalitarism, oppressions, suffering and other typical coca-cola.

Shostakovich composed great chamber music: preludes, sonatas, quarters but as soon he touched large orchestral work then, for whatever reasons, he turned himself into a quite crappy composer, although he did demonstrate a spectacular musical craft. I have to admit that Shostakovich was a remarkably gifted craft-professional and one of the greatest scholars of the Rimsky-Korsakov orchestration school but unfortunately  “all-together” most of his symphonic works are just the well professionally rendered orchestrations of “nothingness”.

For instance, as I remember his First cello concerto, was a sequence of the phrases where instruments straggle to articulate something but they have no reasons or any above-ideas behind those attempts. Suddenly somewhere in the middle the cello and orchestra, totally out of bleu, have a “revelation” and begun to make sense… and surprise, surprise … the “revelation” is a direct borrowing from his 8th quartet…   As soon the “borrowing” was over the music returned to its normal meaningless “presumptuous sounding”. I clearly have no idea why this work (along with may others) was composed to begin with. BTW, try do not search any answers in the REAL accounts of the Shostakovich’s life or Got forbid to familiarize yourself with his original dairies, interviews and writing: they are almost disgusting. For instance his comment in the end of his life that the first movement of his Seventh Symphony: the inflames Russky Bolero – the German aggression march – was originally composed by him in beginning of 30s as a hymn dedicated to a successful propagation of the communists ideas around the world.

As far as his 11 Symphony… It has very few interesting moment but all together I consider it a successful soundtrack for a bad movie. Listen the third movement when the poor orchestra produces senseless “loaded with nothing” sounds and has no idea where to lend them… the typical Shostakovich’s music.

Rgs,
Romy the Cat