Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975)
Symphony No 4 in C minor, Op 43 (1936)
Symphony No 11 in G minor, Op 103 ‘The Year 1905’ (1957)
BBC Symphony Orchestra (4); BBC Philharmonic (11)/Gennady Rozhdestvensky
rec. live, 9 September 1978 Royal Albert Hall, London (4) ADD; 4 October 1997 Bridgewater Hall, Manchester (11) DDD
ICA Classics ICAC5169 [2 CDs: 126]
This is a release of great interest and importance. Gennady Rozhdestvensky (1931-2018) became a personal friend and musical collaborator of Shostakovich; indeed, Harlow Robinson relates in his notes that the conductor and his wife, the pianist Viktoria Postnikova, were among the select group of musicians who were invited to perform at the composer’s funeral in 1975. Rozhdestvensky championed Shostakovich’s music, recording a complete cycle of the symphonies. One significant achievement was his western premiere of the Fourth Symphony in September 1962 when he conducted the Philharmonia at the Edinburgh Festival. The present performance was given around the time that he began his all-too brief tenure (1978-1981) as Chief Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. The date and venue suggest that the concert in question was given towards the end of the 1978 Proms season.
The performance is very impressive indeed. From start to finish, I felt that Rozhdestvensky had got right under the skin of the music. Furthermore, the BBCSO acquit themselves splendidly for their incoming chief. The huge first movement (26:29 on this occasion) can, in lesser hands, appear to have a very disparate structure, but here the conductor leads the listener on convincingly throughout the movement. From the outset, the often-garish detail of Shostakovich’s scoring registers thrillingly and Rozhdestvensky maintains the tension. Rhythms are sharply articulated and the sheer radicalism of the composer’s writing and scoring is plain to hear. The first climax (7:03) is simply brutal. A little later, at the Presto (14:02) the searing pace which Rozhdestvensky sets gives the BBCSO strings a real work-out. The sparely scored closing pages benefit greatly from this conductor’s ear for detail. This is a draining performance, after which I strongly advise listeners to hit the ‘pause’ button in order to draw breath.
The very much shorter middle movement is keenly etched. Every detail is sharply pointed throughout, not least in the ghostly, disembodied conclusion. If I seem to pass over this movement, please don’t think that I regard the performance as anything other than excellent; it’s just that bigger things await us in the colossal third movement. The opening Largo section is dark and highly concentrated; Rozhdestvensky successfully brings out the debt to Mahler in these pages. The main Allegro (from 5:30) is bitingly intense. In the lengthy stretches of music that follow, the important bassoon and trombone solos are expertly rendered. The extended climax (19:10 – 21:30), menacingly underpinned by the pounding timpani, is simply shattering. In the drained music that follows, Rozhdestvensky maintains the intensity right through to the symphony’s hushed, spent ending.
This is an absolutely superb account of a symphony which I believe to be one of Shostakovich’s most important and searching compositions. Rozhdestvensky and his hugely committed orchestra had me on the edge of my seat as they deliver one of the most powerful performances of this work that I can recall hearing.
Nineteen years later, Rozhdestvensky was in Manchester to lead the BBC Philharmonic in a work which I think has been seriously undervalued amongst Shostakovich’s output. The venue was the Bridgewater Hall, then quite recently opened (in September 1996). I can understand those who object that the work contains little in terms of conventional symphonic development and that the symphony is little more than programme music. However, Shostakovich is here commemorating a tragic, significant event in twentieth-century Russian history and does so by constructing an illustrative musical narrative within which several themes return at crucial points. In addition, he may or may not have been making a political point (the symphony dates from the period of the Hungarian uprising), though with this enigmatic composer who, for safety’s sake, understandably kept his cards close to his chest, one can never be sure. Whatever coded message Shostakovich may or may not have been seeking to convey, contemporary Soviet audiences would have had no difficulty in recognising the several revolutionary songs which provided key thematic material. The symphony, which is in four movements, played without a break, certainly justifies the description ‘epic’, applied by annotator Harlow Robinson.
On the face of it, in the long first movement, ‘The Palace Square’, little seems to be happening. The music suggests a glacial landscape as the backdrop against which we hear musical fragments. But the key thing here is that the performance must convey apprehension and tension; Rozhdestvensky undeniably achieves that in a reading characterised by brooding anticipation and great control. The second movement, ‘The 9th of January’ quickly builds from nothing into a state of frenzy; here the conductor displays terrific grip and the BBC Philharmonic responds acutely to his direction. In the Allegro fugal section (from 13:11) Rozhdestvensky does not adopt the electrifying pace set by Andris Nelsons in his vivid Boston recording (review); Rozhdestvensky is steadier, and whilst I prefer the Nelsons approach, his senior colleague certainly imparts menace at this slower pace. The extended climax (16:24 – 18:11) is extremely powerful in this Manchester performance and the numb chill that descends upon the scene after the tumult is over really makes an impact.
The Third movement is entitled ‘Eternal Memory’. At the start we hear a revolutionary song ‘You fell as heroes’ played by the viola section; their collective husky tone is ideally suited to this assignment. In my review of the Nelsons recording, I referred to this movement as “a deeply felt elegy”. Unfortunately, I think Rozhdestvensky miscalculates here. He adopts a flowing pace which is swifter than I can recall hearing in any of the recordings of the work that I own. The pacing robs the tune of its intense melancholy (as is the case when the melody reappears near the end of the movement). It’s this that explains why Rozhdestvensky gets through the movement in a mere 9:00, whereas Nelsons takes 12:28. Thankfully, in the central episode of the movement (from the doleful brass entry at 3:08) Rozhdestvensky adopts a much broader tempo – as I’d expect – and as a result, he’s able to build to a very powerful elegiac climax.
The finale ‘The Tocsin’ may seem to flirt with banality but, actually, I think there’s much more to it than that. Rozhdestvensky proves the point right at the start by bringing out the dark hues in the orchestral scoring. His reading is also full of energy and drive. The BBC Philharmonic offers playing that is crisp and well-focused. The performance achieves a mighty climax before (at 9:05) Shostakovich returns to the hushed, pregnant tension of the symphony’s very opening. The long cor anglais threnody is played with genuine eloquence. At 12:28 the urgent, fast music resumes but, once again, Rozhdestvensky emphasises the dark colours in the scoring, and at the very end any thoughts of optimism are dispelled; we are most definitely listening to a minor-key symphony. There’s a difference of opinion among conductors; some like to let the final bell sound decay naturally, though others don’t make that gesture. There’s no chance of the bell sound being prolonged here; the Manchester audience erupts into an ovation, though the applause is quickly faded out. Clearly, they appreciated an exceptionally fine performance.
Despite my one reservation over a tempo selection in the third movement, this is a very considerable account of the Eleventh Symphony. Rozhdestvensky is a fine interpreter of the score and the BBC Philharmonic plays marvellously for him.
This is an important release. I don’t know if these performances have been issued before but Shostakovich devotees should hasten to add them to their collections. Charismatic as ever, Gennady Rozhdestvensky conducts both symphonies with great authority and understanding, obtaining an electrifying response from both orchestras. I don’t know what remastering, if any, has been done with these recordings – there’s no indication in the ICA booklet – but the sound for both performances is very good indeed. This is a significant release by ICA
Previous review: Ralph Moore (November 2022)
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