Dmitri Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5

On this CD:

1. Symphony No. 5 in D Minor, Op. 47
Composed by Dmitry Shostakovich
Performed by Berlin Symphony Orchestra

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
There's a fascinating controversy surrounding the finale of this symphony. For years it was considered a fitting (if bombastic) triumphant procession in the classic "socialist realist" manner. Then Shostakovich's memoirs were published, in which he called the ending a "celebration for idiots," a hollow victory. It all boils down to how fast you play the ending--the slower it goes, the more agonized it sounds. Sanderling, a personal friend of the composer, is a major proponent of the heavy suffering school. In his hands, the symphony acquires a tragic intensity unmatched by any other performance. It's certainly not the only way to play the music, but it forces you to listen with fresh ears to music which for many years was taken for granted as the "official" Soviet symphony. It's so much more. --David Hurwitz

Tracks:

Concerto For Two Trumpets, 1687: Allegro
Abdelazer: Rondeau
Who Can From Joy Refrain?: A Prince Of Glorious Race
The Morning: The Glitt'ring Sun
The Ephesian Matron, Or The Widow's Tears: Vaudeville
Magnificat In G
Libera Nos
Cantigas de amigo: My Love's Coming Home
My Lady, You Do Great Wrong
Locus iste
Symphony No 14 In A: Tempo di Minuetto
Symphony No 94 In G (The 'Surprise' Symphony): Finale
Gymnopedie No. 1: Gymnopedie No. 1 (Orchestrated By Debussy)
Liederkreis op. 39: Waldesgesprach
Album Leaf In Waltz Form
Prelude And Fugue In A, Op. 87, No. 7
Phil The Fluter's Ball
Piano Concerto In C Sharp Minor, Op. 30: Allegro
O salutaris hostia
Da quel sembiante, D. 688, No. 3
Sonata In G Minor, Op. 5, No. 5: Vivace
Clarinet Quartet No 1 In E Flat, Op. 2: Rondo
String Sextet In A, Op. 48: Furiant
Sherzo In A minor, Op. 81, No. 2
Come You, Mary, Op. 21, No. 2
Chorale Prelude 'Nun freut euch, lieben Christen g' mein'
Deus in adiutorium
Sortie In E Flat

Customer Reviews:

A MUST BUY!!!.......2001-03-03

If I had to choose one CD to spend a month locked in isolation with, this would be the one. Its varied but it flows well together. It's restive and soothing. The quality is beyond excellent!!! At the price, anyone is a fool not to own it, and give it lavishly as gifts. Its gorgeous, lush and fabulous! Everyone that hears it in our home, falls in love with it!

Great music, Excellent Value!.......2000-07-26

Rarely can one buy so much good music for so little. This compilation features almost 80 minutes of high quality music.

This truly is essential!.......1999-10-23

What a brilliant idea from one of our leading record companies! On this disc, they have assembled a programme of highlights from their vast collection of choral, vocal, orchestral, and solo instrumental music that is very satisfying. As with most CDs of this sort, it is a case of some tracks not appealing as much as others- I for instance am a lover of choral music so the gorgeous renditions of Stanford's "Magnificat" by St. Paul's Cathedral Choir or John Sheppard's divine motet "Libera Nos" by the Sixteen are obvious preferences of mine. However, whether you seek dyed-in-the-wool orchestral classics as Haydn's "Surprise" Symphony, less familiar works performed by period artists (such as "'E irei Madr'a Vigo" by ancient Spanish composer Martin Codax), or snippets of breathtaking instrumental solos (such as the rousing performance of Lefebure-Wely's "Sortie in E flat" which is sadly only an excerpt), this disc is bound to have something on it for you. And all of it is finely recorded.

Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5 / Symphony No. 6 [The Mravinsky Collection]

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Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5 / Symphony No. 6 [The Mravinsky Collection]

Manufacturer: Russian Disc
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: B000001LN4
Release Date: 1996-02-26

Tracks:

Sym No.6 in b, Op.54: Largo
Sym No.6 in b, Op.54: Allegro
Sym No.6 in b, Op.54: Presto
Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: Moderato-Allegro Non Troppo
Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: Allegretto
Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: Largo
Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: Allegretto Non Troppo

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Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5
Dmitri Shostakovich , and Bernard Haitink
Manufacturer: Polygram Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Average customer rating:

magnificent

Dmitri Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5

Manufacturer: Linn Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Tracks:

Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: I. Moderato
Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: II. Allegreto
Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: III. Largo
Sym No.5 in d, Op.47: IV. Allegro Non Troppo

Customer Reviews:

magnificent.......1999-09-17

The antiphony between the cellos and violins were like the cries of humanity, this I think is played just like the composer would have wanted

Shostakovich: Symphony No 14, etc / Varady, Fischer-Dieskau, Wenkel; Haitink

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A Richly Nuanced Performance of Shostakovich's Symphony of Death
Please note: This isn't in Russian
Shostakovich And Matters Of Death
Utterly spiritual!
Surprisingly, Perhaps, a Dimly-Burning Wick of Hope

Shostakovich: Symphony No 14, etc / Varady, Fischer-Dieskau, Wenkel; Haitink
Dmitri Shostakovich , Bernard Haitink , Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau , Julia Varady , Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam , and Ortrun Wenkel
Manufacturer: Decca
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Dmitri Shostakovich: Symphony No. 15 / From Jewish Folk Poetry - Bernard Haitink
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ASIN: B00000IP3J
Release Date: 2000-08-08

Tracks:

Symphony No.14, Op.135: De profundis
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Malaguena
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Loreley
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Le Suicide
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Les Attentives I
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Les Attentives II
Symphony No.14, Op.135: A la Sante
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Reponse des cosaques zaparogues...
Symphony No.14, Op.135: O Delvig, Delvig!
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Der Tod des Dichters
Symphony No.14, Op.135: Schluss-Stuck
6 Poems Of Marina Tsvetaeva, Op.143a: My Poems
6 Poems Of Marina Tsvetaeva, Op.143a: Such Tenderness
6 Poems Of Marina Tsvetaeva, Op.143a: Hamlet's Dialogue With His Conscience
6 Poems Of Marina Tsvetaeva, Op.143a: The Poet And The Tsar
6 Poems Of Marina Tsvetaeva, Op.143a: No, The Drum Beat
6 Poems Of Marina Tsvetaeva, Op.143a: To Anna Akhmatova

Customer Reviews:

A Richly Nuanced Performance of Shostakovich's Symphony of Death.......2006-02-04

Despite the fact that there are multiple recordings of Shostakovich's deeply moving Symphony No. 14, this rather old but remastered recording is unique in the quality of performance: Bernard Haitink conducts his Concertgebouw Orchestra and elected to use non-Slavic singers Julia Varady and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau who in turn sing the poems in their original languages rather than the Russian translations used in the original premiere. The effect is staggeringly beautiful and if one must choose a single recording of this symphony, this would be the one that captures the essence of Shostakovich's vision.

Written in 1969 while ill, Shostakovich was naturally achingly concerned about his impending death and in response to his admiration for Moussorgsky's 'Songs and Dances of Death' he wished to make his musical statement about the end of life. 'They wanted the finale to be comforting, to say that death is only the beginning. But it's not a beginning, it's the real end, there will be nothing afterwards, nothing.' And with this grim concept he selected eleven poems by a varied group of poets who mostly died young: Garcia Lorca, Guillaume Appollinaire, Wilhelm Kuchelberger, and Rainer Maria Rilke. The poems are sung by soprano and baritone solo and in duet, and the beauty of Varady and Fischer-Dieskau intoning the words in Spanish, French, Russian, and German somehow gives the poetry more immediacy.

The orchestration is for twenty-one performers: two percussionist, celesta, and eighteen strings. The writing is transparent and delicate with some of the most gorgeous sectional ensemble playing (particularly for cellos and double bass) Shostakovich ever wrote. Haitink serves the score well. As an additional bonus on this CD, Haitink conducts the `Six Poems of Marina Tsvetaeva' beautifully sung by Ortrun Wenkel. For this reviewer the experience of hearing this chamber work that speaks so profoundly about death in the wonder of the acoustic of Disney Hall in Los Angeles makes this symphony emphatically one of Shostakovich's finest works. Esa-Pekka Salonen with the LA Philharmonic approached the work with such humanity and utter clarity of performance, using as soloists Matthias Goerne and brilliant young Russian dramatic soprano Tatiana Pavlovskaya to breathe meaning and incredible atmosphere that the effect was one of those once in a lifetime experiences. If only THAT performance could be added to the recorded repertoire.... Highly recommended. Grady Harp, February 06

Please note: This isn't in Russian.......2005-09-29

I haven't researched the various versions of the Shostakovich 14th, but my other CD under Bernstein is sung entirely in Russian, even though the poems come from other languages as well. I believe that's the standard way, but here Haitink's singers adapt to French, Spanish, etc. as these languages come up. This gives the original poets their native voices back, which i like. It also eliminates one layer of Slavic lugubriousness, which frankly can become quite oppressive when the texts are performed entirely in Russian.

Shostakovich And Matters Of Death.......2005-08-06

Like Gustav Mahler before him, Dmitri Shostakovich, towards the end of his life, began concerning himself with matters of death in his works. Here was a composer who had seen the horrors of two world wars, seen his artistic ambitions constricted by the demands of Joseph Stalin, and seen his older contemporary Sergei Prokofiev suffer the tortures of the damned under Stalin's reign of terror, and yet Shostakovich had survived and succeeded, largely thanks to sage champions on this side of the Iron Curtain such as Bernstein, Stokowski, and Ormandy.

But in his own ironic way, by the 1960s, he was dealing with Death itself, as can be gauged from his Fourteenth Symphony, a work in eleven parts that utilizes texts from writers such as Federico Garcia Lorca, Guillaume Apollinaire, Wilhelm Kuchelbecker, and Rainer Maria Rilke. The symphony, which requires soprano, bass, percussion, and string orchestra, was composed by Shostakovich in 1969 and premiered by his fellow composer Benjamin Britten in England in 1970. It remains thoroughly modern, but its subject is timeless. The same is true for the song cycle "6 Poems Of Marina Tsvetaeva", which he first scored for contralto and piano in 1973 and orchestrating them the following year, one year before he passed away.

Featuring Julia Varady, Ortrun Wenkel, and the legendary Dietrich Fisher-Dieskau, this recording is equally stunning for the conducting of the Concertgebouw Orchestra of Amsterdam by its longtime music director Bernard Haitink. Though these works were recorded a quarter century ago as part of Haitink's complete survey of Shostakovich's symphonies (a set that also included the London Philharmonic), the recording has aged fantastically well, and the three-prong combination of vocalists, orchestra, and conductor are superb in bringing Shotakovich's visions to the forefront, though they don't skip over the ever-present irony that was a trademark of the composer. A must-have for anyone with a taste for modern music in general, and Shostakovich in particular.

Utterly spiritual!.......2005-07-26

Mondelli and kph37's reviews are really into the spirit of the work, and I have no complaints with them at all.

There are political considerations on two levels. Let me dispose of the first quickly, though I don't mean to do so, because Haitink is truly one of the great conductors of the 20th century. But let's face it that he got caught up in the conductor contest of the Post-Reiner era, when recording companies were elevating Their Man over the others in a marketing joust. Poor Bernard was, in my opinion, a victim in this competition. He was the one who saw the value in letting us hear the inner parts, apart from the raging brass of Solti and colorful antics of Bernstein. Mercy!

As for Fidi's shortness of breath or trailing line, well, I think this was the reason for staging him in the work. Imagine, by contrast, bringing in, say, the great Erich Kunz. The bass-baritone portions of this work are those of resignation, not of confidence. For the sake of the poetry, Fidi was perfect. He is not supposed to be the bombast vocalist. His is the voice of sad resignation.

Now, the other political level, that of the composer. Shostakovich lived under Stalin's thumb, to an extent that no composer today can imagine. Some understanding of history is in order. Dmitri was in a life and death struggle with the homicidal maniac controlling the former Soviet Union. Some understanding of art requires an understanding of history. And, therefore, of empathy with Dmitri.

All told, this is a sublime recording. In future generations, the work will be reviewed only from the technical point of view. It takes musicians who lived through that ghastly horror of the German invasion of Russia, of one racist terrorist regime invading another.

This is a very perturbing work. Who could have done it better than those who lived through it?

Then, Ortrum Wenkel's performance of the Tsvetaeva songs should be given more attention. Yes, they are pretty literal readings. But aren't the works written the same dead pan way? These are hardly folksongs in the sense of Mahler or Britten, but introspective pieces. I really like her work here.

Buy this CD it while it lasts.

Surprisingly, Perhaps, a Dimly-Burning Wick of Hope.......2002-01-24

This is a clean and exciting performance of the fourteenth symphony; I still remember the chills I felt, hearing it the first time some seventeen years ago. This is the sort of piece which only Edward Gorey would like to listen to on a daily basis, but it is an exquisitely artistic outpouring of grief, rage, despair ... yet not, I think, of absolute resignation.

Most of the texts have to do with death, and almost none of the texts regards death in any light other than hopeless, or at the least sardonic. But there is one note something discordant to the otherwise unremitting gloom.

"O Delvig, Delvig!" always struck me as the heart of the fourteenth symphony, all the more for its warm, passionate cello choir, standing in stark contrast to the "flint-faced" sardonicism ("Malagueña," "Les Attentives I & II," "Réponse des cosaques zaporogues") and the externally-dramatic bleakness ("Lorelei," "À la Santé," and the bookends "De Profundis" and "Der Tod des Dichters") of most of the rest of the symphony.

And here at what, musically, I have always felt to be the quiet, self-effacing heart of the piece, we find a text which differs, not sharply perhaps, but significantly, from the unrelieved tone of despair-at-darkness of all the rest of the texts, which (with epochal significance) are more recent ... the sharp-relieved word-paintings of Garcia Lorca, the urbane rationalism and withering wit of Appolinaire. Here, in the company of some of the world's most highly-regarded poets (to add Rilke) we find a highly personal dedicatory poem, written by the unknown-outside-Russia Küchelbecker.

Baron Anton Antonovich Delvig (1798-1831) and Wilhelm Karlovich Küchelbecker (1797-1846) were both friends of Pushkin's, from their school days at the Imperial Lyceum at Tsarskoye Selo (where there still stands a magnificent palace with extensive grounds). All three were poets, men of education and refinement. Delvig was packed off to Siberia, and executed as a revolutionary.

O Delvig, Delvig! What reward is there
for noble deeds and verse?
Where and what is the joy in talent
amongst villains and fools?
In Juvenal's austere hand
the dreaded lash whistles at the villains
and wipes the color from their cheeks.
The power of the tyrants trembled

O Delvig, Delvig, what is persecution?
Immortality is the reward
both of valiant, inspired deeds
and of sweet singing!
Thus our union will not die,
proud, joyful and free!
In happiness and grief, firm is the union
of lovers of the eternal Muse!

The poem fits into Shostakovich's work with conveniently thorough aptness. The two obscurer poets were friends of Pushkin's, himself not only the Great Man of Russian letters, but an artist who found that his works needed to pass a censor. Delvig was a poet who got caught in the wheels of politics, and paid with his life.

Yet the message of the poem is not gloom alone; it is not simply a weeping at the injustices of society against Art and the Individual. It is an assurance that noble deeds and sweet singing are rewarded with immortality, and that the artistic bond of the friends will never die, either. The poem is actually a positive response to external grief.

For all the unrelenting gloom of the rest of the symphony, for all that Shostakovich is quoted as saying, "Death is it, after death, there is nothing" ... for all this, I don't believe that Shostakovich could have LIVED like that ... and certainly here in the fourteenth symphony, he did not quite write like that. This text, its musical treatment, and its place in the shape of the symphony, all this together is the dimly burning wick which would not be blown out.

And too, the one text set in the symphony which has nothing in particular to do with death ("Réponse des cosaques zaporogues") is about rage at, and contempt for, despots, expressed by a fiercely proud, free people. This reminds me that another piece of Shostakovich's which I have long meant to investigate is "The Execution of Stepan Razin," a cossack folk-hero who is a symbol of the spiritual power of free resistance against an oppressor.

And the ending of the fourteenth symphony is not the bleak, still resignation of "De Profundis/Der Tod des Dichters" ... but an ironic clip-clop "Conclusion"... and the closing musical gesture is a clipped, tutti, raging in the strings.

Certainly a great deal of his experience would teach Shostakovich despair, and it would have taken an extraordinarily strong and determined character to resist learning so.

Yet in this work, I see more than just the cynicism. You can be taught to say things, taught even to feel things as though they are practically inside you, and a lot of the life you step through can be about those things ... and yet, down underneath all the accreted layers, you may feel that, really, it isn't, cannot be, true.

Like Martin Luther King's "there cannot be great disappointment where there is not great love" ... I wonder if the sharpness, the bitterness, is a refusal to accept. At any rate, I do not see it as an idea he has come to peace with ... at least, not in the fourteenth symphony.

Shostakovich: Festive Overture Op.96; Symphony No.5 Op.47 [Germany]
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Shostakovich: Festive Overture Op.96; Symphony No.5 Op.47 [Germany]
Mackerras , and Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Manufacturer: RPO
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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ASIN: B000051KNM
Release Date: 2006-05-03

Tracks:

Festive Overture, Op.96
Symphony No.5 In D Minor, Op.47 - Moderato
Symphony No.5 In D Minor, Op.47 - Allegretto
Symphony No.5 In D Minor, Op.47 - Largo
Symphony No.5 In D Minor, Op.47 - Allegro Non Troppo

Average customer rating:

Great emotional impact, a milestone for Bychkov

Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5

Manufacturer: Polygram Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD
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Shostakovich: Symphony No. 11

ASIN: B00000E3HV
Release Date: 1990-10-25

Customer Reviews:

Great emotional impact, a milestone for Bychkov.......2005-11-11

Semyon Bychkov must be the darkest horse in the race among great conductors. Even though he was reguarly leading the Berlin Phil. before he turned thirty and toured with the orchestra at their invitation, I doubt that many Americans know his name outside Buffalo, whose orchestra he led after his initial, meteoric rise. He had a major recording contract with Philips, who clearly believed he was the Next Thing. Now conducting in Cologne, Bychkov gets engagements at the level of a James Conlon, David Robertson, Roberto Alagna, and Daniele Gatti, when he deserves to be ranked with Gergiev and Tamirkanov among great Russian emigres.

The Gramophone said that this CD of the Shostakovich Fifth was touched by genius. You wouldn't know it from the opening bars, which sound almost indifferent in their moderation. But in time this movement builds into a powerhouse of intensity, rivaling even Mravinsky. The Scherzo is deliberate and heavy-footed rather than sharply sardonic or pained--it's the least convicning part of Bychkov's reading. But then we get a mesmerizing slow movement, quite the best I've ever heard, and a finale almost as intense as Bernstein's famous NY Phil. recording from the Fifties, yet far better played by the magnificent Berlin Phil. The controversial coda is slow and weighty rather than a race to the finish. The sonics are clear and up close, but as with many digital projects, the pianissimos are very soft and the fortissimo climaxes deafening. It's hard to find one volume level for the whole thing.

This is easily one of the most original, striking, and riveting Shostakovich Fifths around. Not only does it grip you musically, but Bychkov has a rare talent--shared with Bernstein--for taking the banal or rhetorical stretches (they exist in all of Shostakovich's major works) and weaving them into a totally convincing argument. Five stars, without a doubt.

Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5 in D minor, Op.47 / Ballet Suite No. 5 from "The Bolt" Op. 27A - Neeme JÃ¤rvi / Scottish National Orchestra

Average customer rating:

an excellent reading from the middle of the interpretive spectrum
Non, Non! Not a Starter!
Beautifully Paced Fifth---Exquisite Ballet
Good, but look elsewhere for a better Fifth Symphony.

Shostakovich: Symphony No. 5 in D minor, Op.47 / Ballet Suite No. 5 from "The Bolt" Op. 27A - Neeme JÃ¤rvi / Scottish National Orchestra

Manufacturer: Chandos
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Dmitri Shostakovich:Symphony No. 10/Ballet Suite No. 4
Shostakovich: Symphony No. 8 in C minor, Op. 65 - Neeme Järvi / Scottish National Orchestra
Shostakovich: Symphony No. 9; Festive Overture; Suite from Katerina Ismailova; Tea for Two

ASIN: B000000AHZ
Release Date: 1992-10-28

Tracks:

Symphony No. 5 In D Minor, Op. 47: I. Moderato - Allegro non troppo
Symphony No. 5 In D Minor, Op. 47: II. Allegretto
Symphony No. 5 In D Minor, Op. 47: III. Largo
Symphony No. 5 In D Minor, Op. 47: IV. Allegretto non troppo
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): I. Overture
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): II. The Bureaucrat
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): III. The Dance Of The Drayman
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): IV. Kozelkov's Dance With Friends
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): V. Intermezzo
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): VI. Dance Of Colonial Woman Slave
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): VII. The Appeaser
Ballet Suite No. 5 From 'The Bolt' Op. 27A (1931): VII. General Dance And Apotheosis

Customer Reviews:

an excellent reading from the middle of the interpretive spectrum.......2006-11-30

The aesthetic character of this reading of the fifth Shostakovich symphony lies about halfway in-between the apollonian objectivity of Haitink's recording with the Amsterdam Concertgebouw at one end of the spectrum, and the dionysian emotional abandon of Bernstein's 1959 album (not the other, and inferior, 80s recording) with the New York Philharmonic at the other. Both of those other recordings are very good, and each approach reveals different things in this gorgeous score; I find that Neeme Järvi's performance here incorporates many of the virtues of both Haitink's more detached, matter-of-fact reading in some passages and Bernstein's passionate, over-the-top reading in others. It's a marvelous interpretation of a piece that easily has enough depth to convey different shades of meaning with each different approach to it.

The ballet suite from The Bolt isn't the score that the Fifth is, but it's captivating and powerful, and since it's rarely heard it makes this disc the best album of the three I've considered here, if you're looking at the program as a whole and not just at the symphony. I can't imagine that anyone who's interested in orchestral music wouldn't really, really like this album.

Non, Non! Not a Starter!.......2006-06-07

The Jarvi 5th has been overrated by Gramophone as a starter introduction. I agree with other reviewers here that the tempos are erratic perhaps, as also pointed out, that the symphony has very obviously not been rehearsed. Its too loud in parts if one sets the volume to hear the softer very quiet segments of the score. Chandos Records are known for the quality of their recordings but this disk would also be a bad introduction to Chandos. I prefer Haitink/Concertgebouw. It leaves its imprint on you even years after having heard it.

Beautifully Paced Fifth---Exquisite Ballet.......2003-11-11

Jarvi and the SCO perform an outstanding playing of one of the most popular symphonies. Their pace is smooth and the finale is superb, building to neither too dominant brass as in some, but tight and sounds perfectly balanced.

The ballet has quite a history behind it, premiering in Leningrad in 1933. The Allegro is magnificent featuring the fine flute/bassoon duet as well as the senusal dances culminating in a rapturous waltz, sequenced thereafter by other dancers sung by soloist highlighted dancers, including one very nice sylophone. Very high spirited and charged piece and most enjoyable.

Good, but look elsewhere for a better Fifth Symphony........2003-10-30

While the forces here offer a good performance I am not nearly as keen on my praises as I am regarding their versions of the composer's Fourth and Tenth Symphonies. Jarvi just does not get inside the Fifth's inner details as much as Haitink and the Concertgebouw or Mravinsky in his live 1966 recording for Russian Disc. Though Haitink falls a bit short on intensity in the largo and humor/sarcasm in the allegretto he and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw compensate with darker and richer tones throughout. The general character of the symphony notwithstanding, the orchestral sounds produced are frequently beautiful, (credit also the Decca engineers). Personally, and in part because of this, I find his account more enjoyable. Moreover, there are places throughout the symphony, where, in contrast to Haitink and especially Mravinsky, Jarvi tends to soften the musical outline. This, in turn, has the effect of lessening a sense of impact. Of course, if it's real impact you want, Mravinsky is your man. The level of intensity during moments of his live performance should help to give your ears a good cleaning. I also feel his reading comes closest to reflecting the spirit and intent of the composer.

With respect to the Ballet Suite No. 5 from "The Bolt", I have little to carp about. As a ballet, it is certainly a far cry from Tchaikovsky, especially in terms of its emotional and instrumental personality. But, this is vivid, colorful and engrossing music, spiked with boldness, wit of all shades and, yes, charm. It is all unflagginly musical and refreshingly enjoyable, thanks in good part to the performing team.

Average customer rating:

Highly confident, forward-looking performances from Gergiev
So much better expected from Gergiev with DSCH
Music to apologize and music to cause problems
Pales in comparison to other recordings, esp. Haitink's
As fine as we have come to expect form Gergiev and Kirov

Shostakovich: Symphonies Nos. 5 & 9
Valery Gergiev , Dmitri Shostakovich , and Kirov Orchestra
Manufacturer: Philips
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Shostakovich: Symphony No. 7
Shostakovich: Symphony No. 8
Shostakovich: Symphony No. 4

ASIN: B00022LJGK
Release Date: 2004-05-11

Tracks:

I. Moderato
II. Allegretto
III. Largo
IV. Allegro Non Troppo
I. Allegro
II. Moderato
III. Presto
IV. Largo
V. Allegretto - Allegro

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Gergiev pairs Shostakovich's most popular symphony with one of his wittiest. The Fifth was a lifesaver for the composer, literally. He'd come under severe attack from Stalin and his minions over the opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, and Siberia or worse loomed. The Fifth was his response, a 1937 work of "socialist realism" glorifying "Soviet man." The subtext was quite different, the finale's numbing outburst of screaming brass and relentless drums implicitly damning the official line. But it's hardly a formulaic work, as its attractive melodies are clothed in typical Shostakovichian garb. Gergiev and the Kirov band capture the buildup of tension in the first movement, the sardonic nature of the Allegretto, and the grim Largo, as well as that ambiguous finale. The post-war Ninth was a return to his earlier cheeky style, a witty work full of high spirits. The Kirov excels here too, capturing the mocking vulgarity of the second movement and the satirical finale. Identical pairings of the two works are available from Yuri Temirkanov and Leonard Bernstein, but Gergiev's belongs in their company. --Dan Davis

Customer Reviews:

Highly confident, forward-looking performances from Gergiev.......2006-03-24

As the mixed reviews would suggest, Gergiev's Shotakovich Fifth and Ninth won't be to everyone's taste. If you are looking for the best possible sound and superb orchestral execution, however, you need look no further--these are plush readings captured in demonstration-quality sonics. The problems, if they arise, have to do with interpretation. Gergiev sees both works as positive and forward-loking; there are no hidden messages from a dissident artist suffering under totalitarian oppression.

In other words, Gergiev gives us "official" Shostakovich, and that affronts listeners who want these works to be subversive. Leonard Bernstein took the same positive approach to the Fifth Sym. in his famous 1959 recording, and yet Gergiev betters him in grandness, helped by incredibly lifelike sound. The Kirov Orch. outplyas the NY Phil, the first Russian ensemble of which this could be said. We hear Shostakovich's music played with such precision and fullness that it's quite breathtaking at times, and the eloquent Largo of the Fifth is even more so under Gergiev's passionate direciton. Bernstein excels his rival only in the finale, where instead of following the composer's fairly measured opening Allegro, Bernstein races away in a breathless Presto that transforms the music and rids it of pomposity. Gergive adheres to the score and therefore runs the risk of sounding rhetorical.

The Ninth is performed with equally impressive technique and great recorded sound, but here Gergiev has a new idea. The Ninth offended the Soviet musical establishment with its cheekiness; a heroic symphony was expected in tribute to the travail of the Russian people during WW II. Ever since, conductors have tried to outdo each other to make the Ninth sound irreverent--a raspberry in the face of a repressive regime--but Gergiev expands it into another forward-looking, positive work. You may miss the irreverence, but in this optimistic version the symphony sounds bigger, more important, and also slower. I was convinced by Gergiev on his own terms, and again the beauty of hte recorded sound is quite seductive.

In all, this is a major release in the Shostakovich discography and a great success for all concerned.

So much better expected from Gergiev with DSCH.......2005-11-22

A disappointing release. After having heard Gergiev do broadcasts of the Fourth Symphony and both from St Petersburg and from the Met of Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, this release of the Fifth and Ninth Symphonies does not measure up to the standard that can be expected from him and his Mariinsky forces. There is no better referendum on the results that come on this recording, than the consistently excellent solos from all the first stands, and long by now, the fully developed cohesion of all sections in this orchestra.

All of this is fine, but when rehearsal, preparation time is lacking, there is nothing better to rely upon than a few gimmicks. Hearing this sort of thing happen, if one was new to Gergiev, would make one think that he had not been around the block more than a couple of times, when so many of us know that nothing could be farther from the truth.

One does not have to listen very far on this disc, to pick out what I talk about here. The bulgy allargando gestures on the opening dotted figures that start to the opening movement of Five is a case in point. Steeply arched crescendi to anticipate restatements of ideas early on also begin to give the game away, along with the constant underlining, and grunting, groaning from the podium to further abet this way of going about things. The middle section of the first movement gets pushed very hard, but without quite an entirely sufficient or sufficiently planned goal in mind, so that the recapitulatory statement of the main theme ultimately gets undercut. Same error in judgment that happens on so many Bernstein recordings, his 1959 recording of this piece a notable exception. Apart from exaggerating one or two more lyrical gestures, the closing section of the first movement goes very well.

Solo work at the end of the first movement, and apart from an excessively halting oboe solo at the end of the second movement, there as well, is all excellent, again. Gergiev both starts and ends the second movement too heavily, with far too much underlining, but a good eighty percent of the movement goes very well. The cat and mouse for the reprise of the scherzo between plucked violins and bassoons underneath, while not being a novel touch, does enliven things quite a bit.

The same problems that afflict the first movement also hurt the slow movement. The opening statement in the violins sags, depriving the opening section of this movement of line. Climactic places in the movement are undercut by there having been too much underlining again earlier. Following the largest crest to the line in the opening section of this movement, marked Largamente, being undercut, the Poco piu mosso section that follows quickly becomes very episodic. Apart from harp beginning to drown out celesta in the closing line to this movement, the atmosphere is almost entirely right for the end of the movement. The finale to Five here is also almost entirely episodic in character. Reminder of the failure on Philips that the green Bychkov with Berlin was on this piece, is the slightly excessive legato for the cortege reprise of the opening theme in lower winds. Once into the D Major coda, Gergiev goes full out in making the close of this movement seem as oppressive as the composer most likely wished, with an effective sharp cutoff for the percussion right before deliberately elaborated cadence.

The Ninth Symphony fares even a little less well than the Fifth here. Gergiev opens the first movement in chamber orchestra vein, with what sounds like a reduced number of violins. Things quickly get sombre, heavy, and in rhythmic shape, foursquare, making the opening in retrospect seem entirely insipid and the entire effort humorless. Kondrashin is criticized for being too unsmiling with this music. His Ninth in at least his Philips recording of it, is severe, along clearly drawn classical lines, the element of parody in this music never out of perspective, but this is sombre. Forced, rather slurpy rubato weighs down the slow quasi Valse triste second movement, the scherzo is pushed too hard, and the finale almost goes ahead of the finale to the Fifth here, in sounding completely episodic.

A fine Eighth (1994) on Philips, that for a few critics warned of glibness beginning to surface from Gergiev, for my purposes still makes the cut, albeit without effacing memories of Mravinsky with this piece. I have yet to hear the new release of the Fourth, but based on the broadcast I heard six years ago, there is some reason for hope for this release.

In terms of orchestral brilliance and sound quality, this disc of Five and Nine merits four stars, and for the diehard Gergiev fan out there, probably will work entirely. I give it two, because of how much better on this music can be expected than we get here. The Haitink coupling of Five and Nine, the latter a bit too sombre in a few places, originally in a pairing on cd with an excellent First, makes a sound recommendation, if a little shy of a definitive one for these two works. For those who do not mind dated sound quality, Ancerl and Mravinsky should be sought out for recordings of the Fifth.

Music to apologize and music to cause problems.......2005-07-01

As the title of this review reads, this
is all the music on this recording is
about. Music to apologize: after the
disaster of the opera "Lady Macbeth"
Shostakovich criticized to the point
by the authorities that his entire
opus was on japordy. The symphony #5
serves as an "apology" for past musical
"mistakes". Shostakovich used his genius
to once again win the favor of the authorities.
Music to cause problems: after Russia's
victory during the second world war, the
Soviet composers were expected to write patriotic
music to celebrate the victory over the
Germans. Shostakovich's task was in somewhat
seen somewhat more important, because his
1945 symphony bearing the auspicious # 9
and since Beethoven's 9th a composer's 9th
was to be epic and celebratory. Instead Shostakovich
composes his smallest symphony.
No chorus, nor soloists as the regime had
expected, this work was not liked by the
authorities, but abroad became one of the
composer's most liked and favorite of all.
Is a light work, in a more classical style.
Shostakovich places an eye back in the 18th
century with this work.
Gergiev and the Kirov do a wonderful work; and
the sound quality is great too.

Pales in comparison to other recordings, esp. Haitink's.......2004-10-17

This Philips disc gives us a performance of Dmitri Shostakovich's Fifth and Ninth symphonies by the the Kirov Orchestra of the Mariinsky Theatre, St Petersburg conducted by Valery Gergiev. I found it rather lackluster and not one of the essential recordings of these works.

The Fifth is perhaps Shostakovich's most well-known symphony, written in 1935 as the composer was chided for not conforming to the socialist realist norms of his country's new musical tradition in some earlier works. It is only faux socialist realism, for underneath this veneer lies a great deal of musical trickery. Those interested in Shostakovich's real socialist-realist efforts, which are really his greatest works, should look to the Third or Twelfth symphonies.

At first, Gergiev's handling of the 5th shows excellent sensitivity and pacing. The sound is pleasant and keeps the listener involved. Unfortunately, everything falls apart at the fourth and final movement. Gergiev conducts it far too fast, and a lot of the emotional weight and sense of praise and triumph (whether of Communism, of freedom, of Man, who knows) is gone. The drums of the finale, which should sound proud, are instead brash and unappealing.This was a profound disappointment after such a fine beginning. Subsequent listenings made it slightly less alienating, but I must say I still prefer the performance of the Royal Concertgeouw with Haitink.

The Ninth is certainly the least substantial of Shostakovich's symphonies. Written to celebrate the end of World War II, it is no triumphant praise of the Soviet motherland or proud victory march, but rather a light piece of simple relief and new contentedness. This is supposed to be an airy and breezy piece, but Gergiev drives the orchestra to play too heavily and in certain portions (as at the end of the first movement) the result is simply cacophonous.

The liner notes, written by Andrew Huth, are merely satisfactory, though they give a fuller perspective on the impact of the 9th than those of many recordings. The coverage of the 5th loses points, however, for quoting TESTIMONY, the supposed memoirs of Shostakovich as told to Simon Volkov which his widow and many close friends have revealed as forgery. The graphic design of this release is rather poor, with misplaced images covering up text inside the booklet and incongruous World War II propaganda art outside. The back also proclaims "Sung text enclosed", though these are purely instrumental works. From this I got the impression that the entire deal was rather rushed, meant to capitalise on Gergiev's current fashionability and congrue with his earlier recording of the Seventh.

Generally I find this recording inferior to the same pairing conducting by Bernard Haitink with the Concertgebouw (5th) and London Sinfonietta (9th) available on Decca. It seems like a great mistep. Gergiev can be an excellent conductor--see his expert handling of Sofia Gubaidulina's magisterial JOHANNES-PASSION, but this is not one of his finer efforts.

As fine as we have come to expect form Gergiev and Kirov.......2004-09-11

The symphonies of Dmitri Shostakovich are in the body and heart of conductor Valery Gergiev. Put him on the podium before his Kirov Orchestra and the results are richly textured, tense, exciting, and satisfying performances. This album, which aptly pairs the Fifth and the Ninth Symphonies, is all the more vital in that it is recorded during live performances. The acoustics are grand and spacious and the arching lines and quirky diversions inherent in Shostakovich's work are refined and at the same time 'raw', in the best sense of the word. In the Fifth, Gergiev surprises with a few personal inflections in his timings and phrasings and makes the first movement especially fresh. Few conductors can serve these quintessential Russian symphonies better than Gergiev. Keep the whole cycle coming!

The Kondrashin Recordings - Shostakovich: Symphony No. 6; Nielsen: Symphony No. 5

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The Kondrashin Recordings - Shostakovich: Symphony No. 6; Nielsen: Symphony No. 5
Dmitri Shostakovich , Kirill Kondrashin , and Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam
Manufacturer: Polygram Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD
ASIN: B00000E570
Release Date: 1993-11-09

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