Dmitri SHOSTAKOVICH (1906-1975)
Music from the films - Volume 5
Golden Hills Suite Op.30a (1931) [21:59]
The tale of the Priest and his worker Balda Op.36 (1934) [14:49]
Adventures of Korzinkina Op.59 (1940) [10:13]
The Silly Little Mouse Op.56 (1939) [15:22]
Byelorussian Radio and TV Symphony Orchestra/Walter Mnatsakanov [Op.30a only];
State Cinematographic Orchestra/Walter Mnatsakanov
rec. Mosfilm Studios, Moscow, Russia, February 1997 (Opp. 36, 56, 59) April
1997 (Op.30a)
DELOS DRD2005 [62:44] 
Film music was central to the life of Shostakovich. I do not mean by
that that it contains the finest, most personal or indeed the most profound
music he ever composed but its existence kept him alive - quite literally.
Stalin understood on a social level the influence and power of film and watched
private viewings of favourite films every night at his dacha. Whatever that
dictator's megalomaniac madness he understood quite rightly that Shostakovich
was the finest composer for film the Soviet Union possessed. So even in the
terrifying denunciations post Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk in 1936 and
the 1948 Zhdanov decree when official concert programmers shunned Shostakovich
and lesser composers 'disappeared' Stalin ensured that Shostakovich was not
only spared the ultimate sanction of internal exile or even execution but
also fed a trickle of film score commissions that literally kept food on the
Shostakovich family’s table. Don't forget too that the composer allotted most
of these scores opus numbers, so for all of his dismissive railing against
the 'hack-work' nature of some of the music it does need to be considered
as a valid part of the galaxy of his work. Yes they might be moons to the
planets of the great symphonies or quartets but they are part of that
same universe. To apply the same critical value system to say Lady Macbeth
and the film score The Golden Hills recorded here is madness yet
they share adjacent opus numbers. Almost more than any other (great) composer
I can think of Shostakovich is the most pragmatic - his music was composed
to fulfil an imperative be it personal or public. So to dismiss the cinematic
11th and 12th symphonies because they are not as 'good' as the 8th or 10th
is to miss the point - they were not meant to be. Where Shostakovich is truly
remarkable is how often he succeeds in fulfilling perfectly the remit of the
task in hand; the personal quartet is inward and intimate, the symphony a
public statement of often startling braveness - yes even those problematic
cinematic symphonies - check out the actual texts of the quoted folksongs
- the film music apt, entertaining and dramatic as required. It is also worth
remembering that Shostakovich wrote for film through the bulk of his creative
life from the extraordinary New Babylon of 1929 - the new Naxos
complete original recording is eagerly awaited - to the powerful and bleak
King Lear of 1970.
Given how highly I rate the composer in this genre you might rightly expect
that I would be eagerly interested in any series of discs surveying his output.
This disc from Delos is entitled Volume 5. A few things to make clear - these
are licensed re-releases of discs originally made for Russian Disc, in the
case of the current disc in 1997. So for Delos to mark the liner "newly
recorded" is frankly misleading. Yes they have been newly re-mastered
but in no sense are they 'new'. Elsewhere, everything is pretty much as the
avid collector of this type of music would expect. The use of second tier
Russian orchestras and locally sourced master tapes ensures a certain sound
that could be described as somewhat rough and ready. Not that this is necessarily
a bad thing in music like this; it is after all deliberately simplistic in
creation of mood (most of the time) and the shallow sound-stage and slightly
harsh recorded quality add a kind of authenticity to the performances that
works well. On this volume four scores are presented which interestingly straddle
the famous "muddle instead of music" denunciation of 1936. The
Golden Hills and The tale of the Priest and his worker Balda are
from the time when Shostakovich's star was firmly ascendant. The Adventures
of Korzinkina and The Silly Little Mouse are sandwiched between
that denunciation and the Soviet Union's entry into the Second World War.
The former fascinatingly has the Opus number (59) immediately preceding the
Leningrad Symphony which pretty much overnight secured the rehabilitation
of the composer and made him a globally important composer and as such all
but untouchable even in the paranoid Soviet Union.
Although this disc contains a unique combination of scores all are available
elsewhere although in occasionally different editions. The first music here
is both the most recorded and the most 'standard' in the editions used across
other discs. Conductor Walter Mnatsakanov and The Byelorussian Radio &
TV Symphony Orchestra face direct and exact competition from Vassily Sinaisky
and the BBC PO on Chandos (vols 1, 2,
3),
Gennadi Rozhdestvensky and his Ministry of Culture SO on Russian Disc, Mikhail
Jurowski and the Berlin RSO on Capriccio
to name but a few. The Byelorussian players are no match for those in Berlin
or the Ministry of Culture - I have not heard the BBCPO but since they are
a formidable orchestra draw your own conclusions. I should say that the rest
of the disc is played by the State Cinematographic Orchestra whose playing
is superior and they are better recorded. If you are considering buying this
disc you will know the sound-world you are entering; popular musical forms
abound. Polkas, Galops, Waltzes swirl by deliriously tempered by a sudden
bleak intermezzo or an abyss-bound funeral march. I absolutely adore the madness
and disjointed non-sequitur this produces for the listener – it’s like a strangely
bizarre dream-world where the profound and trite collide. Ex-Soviet orchestras
have this genre in their blood and the blatant primary colour nature of much
of the music suits their performance style to perfection. The waltz [track
2] from The Golden Hills is a perfect example. After a perfectly standard
introduction there is a wonderfully woozy guitar solo - here on an instrument
that sounds like a Hawaiian guitar played by someone all the better for a
bottle of rum. It is absolutely perfect (matching Rozhdestvensky's version
where the guitarist is equally inebriated) and in striking contrast to the
much 'better' played/recorded playing for Jurowski - there in its po-faced
correctness missing the character completely. At early performances the third
movement - Fugue - created a stir with its use of a concertante organ
part. Its not a fugue at all which is slightly perplexing. The instrument
on the recording here is quite dreadful - a tubby electronic instrument with
no subtlety or tonal range but again the music does not necessarily require
it. However in this instance both this movement and the others in the suite
are better performed elsewhere. The final eight minute sequence of three sections;
Intermezzo-Funeral March-Finale run together and contain the most heartfelt
and tragic music on the disc. It is passionately played by the Byelorussian
orchestra but they are consistently outclassed by the competition.
Both The tale of the Priest and his worker Balda and The Silly Little
Mouse are scores for cartoons. The former exists in competing versions
- either of the brief 7-movement suite (as recorded here) or 'complete' including
the vocal and choral parts. I have not heard any other version which is perhaps
why I enjoyed this piece most of the music presented here. Even without knowing
of the cartoon background there is a mad-cap Looney-Tunes deliriousness to
this music that is very compelling. The playing of the State Cinematographic
Orchestra is a significant notch up on that of their compatriots. As with
much of the music here it is deliberately illustrative. Shostakovich's great
skill is to fuse memorable melody with the clearly programmatic yet retaining
his distinct personality - whilst often using quite small instrumental groups.
Try the Bazaar movement [track 10] - a veritable riot of colliding
themes and colourful instrumentation yet unmistakably Shostakovich. The second
cartoon score The Silly Little Mouse again raises questions of editions.
At the time this recording was made it could call itself a world premiere
recording. Fourteen years down the line there is competition. This is a mini
children's opera setting a simple fable-like story. In essence the baby mouse
cannot sleep so various animals offer to sing it to sleep. None succeed except
the cunning cat who at the point of devouring the now-resting rodent is chased
away by a dog. That really is the sum extent of the narrative so Shostakovich
does pretty well to extend it to fifteen or so minutes. The recording here
is rather crude with the voices set well forward in a cavernous acoustic -
especially a rather scary female narrator - which dwarfs the orchestral detail
behind. If you want the work complete with narrator and singing (including
a silent part for a pike) there is competition from another version from 'The
Russian Classical collection'. The instrumental part alone has been recorded
by Riccardo Chailly and the Concertgebouw Orchestra as part of their Decca
'Shostakovich
- The Film Album'. Not surprisingly this is in a different league in pure
performance and production terms and this deliberately slight music benefits
from the extra finesse the Dutch orchestra bring. On balance, for this minor
chip from the master's block I think would opt for that version for the sheer
beauty of the sound. For those who do require the full version texts are included
here. The final score is for an abortive 3-part series of comedies which were
shelved with the German invasion. The identical suite from the Adventures
of Korzinkina was recorded again by Rozhdestvensky and variously released
on Olympia as part of a disc called "Manuscripts of different years"
or on an RCA twofer simply called 'Shostakovich Orchestral Works'. These discs
are still findable at a high premium - the latter includes that conductor's
versions of The Golden Hills and The tale of the Priest too.
At every turn Rozhdestvensky seems the more colourful and imaginative interpreter.
One curio; the movement entitled Restaurant Music [track 17] is described
in the liner here as "one of the most inspired pasticcios ever penned
by Shostakovich". It is not a pasticcio (in the strictest musical sense)
at all - a pastiche perhaps. What is more curious is that Mnatsakanov takes
exactly half as long again to play the piece as Rozhdestvensky; three minutes
to the latter's two. Interestingly both versions work but instinct tells me
the faster version 'feels' right. Someone clearly hasn't watched the film
though since there will be an absolute tempo set there that should surely
be recreated. Mentioning the liner, it looks as though Delos has rather lazily
reprinted the original from 1997. Nothing wrong in that as such except that
there has been a significant shift in perception of Shostakovich from guilt-ridden
party acolyte to secret dissident. The revised version of Ian McDonald's 'The
New Shostakovich' puts the dissident case very well and rather debunks phrases
such as "For Shostakovich, all these [musical forms such as the can-can,
fox-trot, tango etc.] symbolised the vulgarity of the nouveau riche and the
bourgeois way of life contained here".
Collectors of this continuing series will not need to read this review to
persuade them to buy this disc or not. For those discovering Shostakovich's
films scores for the first time other performers offer equally idiomatic versions
of these compelling works rendered in far better sound and technical performance.
As a single disc overview the Decca/Chailly disc is hard to beat.
Nick Barnard
Collectors of this continuing series will not need to read this review to
persuade them to buy this disc.