Shostakovich is the
composer Vano
Muradeli, whose claim
to fame in Russian
music is that in 1948 he
was branded with
Shostakovich as a
formalist.
I n 1 959, the first isit to Moscow of
the New York Philharmonic, under
Leonard Bernstein. Shostakovich
preferred Bernstein to all other
American conductors. (Wide World.)
Aaron Copland presented a Certificate of Honorar
Membership from the American Academy and I nstitute of Arts and Letters of the United States to Shostako ich at Tchaikovsky H all in Moscow in 1960. Shostako ich treated such diplomas ironically but hung them neatly on his walls.
With Solomon Volkov.
·
Leningrad, 1 965 .
T H I RT E E N T H
SYM PHONY
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After work on this book had begun,
OAPTHTVPA.
I C O l l
Shostakovich gave Volkov the score of his
Thirteenth Symphony ("Babi Yar") with the
inscription: "To dear Solomon Moiseyevich
Volkov with my very best wishes. D.
Shostakovich. 3 V 1972. Repino."
COl[!�v".�� c����.�!MTOP
Moc:&N lt11 ""--
At a rehearsal of the opera The
Nose, revived in the Soviet Union
after a forty-four-year hiatus: an
exchange of opinions. From the
right: Shostakovich, conductor
of the production Gennady
Rozhdestvensky, Solomon
Volkov. The inscription reads :
"To Solomon Volkov a s a
memento of The N ose-Gennad y
Rozhdestvensky. 16 10 7 5 . "
At a performance of
his last quartet.
Leningrad, 1974.
At his dacha near Moscow
with his grandson.
Shostakovich
reading one
of his
many official
speeches. On
the left, then
Minister of
Culture of the
Soviet Union
Ekaterina
Furtseva.
Funeral of Shostakovich, August 1 4 , 1975, at o odevich Cemetery in Moscow. Aram K hachaturian is ki ing the decea ed's hand ; next to him is his wife, Nina Khachaturian. On the far left i Sho takovich's widow I rina; on the right, his son , Maxim, embracing his i ter, Galya, and his son . Solomon Volko is een between them.
bears little resemblance to Repin's painting. If I had Apollinaire's talent, I would address Stalin with a poem like that. I did it with music.
Stalin is gone, but there are more than enough tyrants around. Another poem by Apollinaire also became part of the Fourteenth-"In the Sante Prison." I was thinking about prison cells, horrible holes, where people are buried alive, waiting for someone to come for them, listening to every sound. That's terrifying, you can go mad with fear.
Many people couldn't stand the pressure and lost their minds. I know about that.
Awaiting execution is a theme that has tormented me all my life.
Many pages of my music are devoted to it. Sometimes I wanted to explain that fact to the performers, I thought that they would have a greater understanding of the work's meaning. But then I thought better of it. You can't explain anything to a bad performer and a talented person should sense it himself. Yet in recent years I've become convinced that the word is more effective than music. Unfortunately, it's so. When I combine music with words, it becomes harder to misinterpret my intent.
I discovered to my astonishment that the man who considers himself its greatest interpreter does not understand my music. * He says that I wanted to write exultant finales for my Fifth and Seventh Symphonies but I couldn't manage it. It never occurred to this man that Lnever thought about any exultant finales, for what exultation could there be?
I think that it is clear to everyone what happens in the Fifth. The rejoicing is forced, created under threat, as in Boris Godunov. It's as if someone were beating you with a stick and saying, "Your business is rejoicing, your business is rejoicing," and you rise, shaky, and go marching off, muttering, "Our business is rejoicing, our business is rejoicing."
What kind of apotheosis is that? You have to be a complete oaf not to hear that. Fadeyev* heard it, and he wrote in his diary, for his personal use, that the finale of the Fifth is irreparable tragedy. He must have felt it with his Russian alcoholic soul.
*Yevgeny Mravinsky.
tAiexander Alexandrovich Fadeyev (1901-1956), an author set up by Stalin as head of the Writers' Union. He signed .many sanctions for the arrest of writers (as did the heads of the other
"creative" unions to their members). After a shift in internal Soviet politics, he committed suicide.
1 83
People who came to the premiere of the Fifth in the best of moods wept. And it's ridiculous to speak of a triumphal finale in the Seventh.
There's even less basis for that, but nevertheless, the interpretation does appear.
Words are some protection against absolute idiocy, any fool will understand when there are words. There's no total guarantee, but a text does make the music more accessible. The premiere of the Seventh is proof of that. I began writing it having been deeply moved by the Psalms of David; the symphony deals with more than that, but the Psalms were the impetus. I began writing. David has some marvelous words on blood, that God takes revenge for blood, He doesn't forget the cries of victims, and so on. When I think of the Psalms, I become agitated.
And if the Psalms were read before every performance of the Seventh, there might be fewer stupid things written about it. That's not a pleasant thought, but it's probably true. Listeners don't understand notes completely, but words make it easier.
This was confirmed at the final rehearsal of the Fourteenth. Even the fool Pavel lvanovich Apostolov* understood what the symphony was about. During the war, Comrade Apostolov commanded a division, and after the war he commanded us, the composers. Everyone knew that you couldn't get through to that blockhead with anything, but Apollinaire was stronger. And Comrade Apostolov, right there at the rehearsal, dropped dead. I feel very guilty, I had no intention of killing him off, even though he was certainly not a harmless man. He rode in on a white horse and did away with all music.
It was after Apostolov's death that I was stunned by two facts. Fact number one: Comrade Apostolov {what a name!) had in his youth taken vocal music courses named after Stravinsky. Poor Stravinsky. It's like Ilf's joke: Ivanov decided to visit the king, who, hearing about it, abdicated. Fact number two: Comrade Apostolov was also a composer, the author of ten funeral epitaph pieces, including "Stars on the Obelisks," "A Minute of Silence," and "Heroes Are Immortal." And there was his life.