Brian Morton quotes Shostakovich himself when the great composer says, “It saddens me that people don’t always understand what it (his music) is about, yet everything is clear in the music.” People often assume that some of the music in Shostakovich’s 7th Symphony in C major dedicated to the City of Leningrad is ‘about’ is the Nazi invasion of Russia, but it might just as well be ‘about’ 15 years of Stalinism and counting. Shostakovich’s Sixth Symphony had been considered by the Politburo censors to be too formalist and individualist and Shostakovich, along with many others, feared a midnight knock at the door and the prospect of the gulag. Also, as Morton relates. his 5th symphony was considered too “bourgeois” and the audience response too ecstatic, stealing the glory if not the thunder from Stalin. As the author wryly remarks: “Only one man in the Soviet Union was entitled to a standing ovation.” It would not have gone unnoticed either that Shostakovich had failed to produce a eulogy to Stalin on the occasion of the dictator’s 60th birthday.
Returning to the 7th Symphony Brian Morton reminds us that many members of the available orchestra were in a “parlous condition”, suffering from starvation and dysentery and that, to paraphrase, “a motley collection of old men, musically literate infantrymen, and a few professionals”, gave the 7th symphony its apotheosis in the rubble of Leningrad. What emerged was a one and a quarter hour long work with a brilliant lengthy opening allegretto, subtitled “Suddenly War Breaks into Our Peaceful Lives”, containing in its latter part one of Shostakovich’s most instantly recognisable refrains with marching drums and a portentous crescendo. Some of the composers compadres might have winced at the subtitling of the final allegro non troppo movement as “Victory and a Beautiful Life in the Future.” The symphony was a big hit amongst U.S. concert goers in particular, we are told, although some critics saw it as propagandist, rhetorical and too long.
Brian Morton relates Shostakovich’s story in an erudite, insightful and highly detailed way that brings to light the trials and tribulations of one of the world’s most talented composers; an immensely readable book, even for those who would not necessarily gravitate towards Shostakovich’s music to any great degree.
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