This is the third instalment in Vasily Petrenko’s Shostakovich
symphony cycle for Naxos. Previously, I’ve heard him in a superb
disc of Rachmaninov orchestral music (see review)
and also in a very fine disc of two of the same composer’s piano
concertos (see review).
His Shostakovich recordings had escaped my attention up till
now, though I remembered that Bob
Briggs and David
Barker had warmly welcomed the performance of the Eleventh
Symphony. The pairing of the Fifth and Ninth symphonies was
admired by Leslie
Wright . The welcome for these discs hasn’t been unanimous,
however: Dan
Morgan was distinctly cool about the Eleventh. So, I was
more than a little curious when the review copy dropped through
my letterbox.
I first got to know this dark, brooding symphony over forty
years ago. It was through the rugged, uncompromising performance
by Kondrashin and the Moscow Philharmonic, issued on LP by EMI
in their hugely valuable HMV Melodiya series. Subsequently,
as I got to know the whole canon of fifteen symphonies, I came
to the conclusion that the Eighth is a masterpiece rivalled
in emotional depth only by the great Tenth.
The Eighth has fared well on disc, not least in Bernard Haitink’s
1982 Concertgebouw recording for Decca. That said, all other
versions that I’ve heard have been put in the shade by the remarkable,
implacable live performance by the dedicatee of the work, Evgeny
Mravinsky, and the Leningrad Philharmonic (issued by BBC Legends).
This disc, which is truly historic in nature, preserves the
UK première of the work in 1960, given in the composer’s presence.
Despite the occasional orchestral fallibilities and the disrespectfully
bronchial audience, it’s required listening (see review).
Petrenko’s reading was set down under studio conditions and,
inevitably, perhaps it lacks some of the electricity of the
Mravinsky concert performance. Even so, it’s a pretty intense
experience, but it has the extra degree of polish that can be
obtained in a studio. It also benefits from infinitely superior
sound.
The Mravinsky account is distinguished by a tremendous weight
of tone, especially in the strings – apparently the orchestra
that evening mustered eighteen players in each of the
first and second violin sections! That said, the RLPO strings
are by no means put in the shade. After the initial rhetorical
motto on cellos and basses the violins achieve a breathtaking
ppp and the strings sustain the bleak opening pages,
lasting four minutes or so, with excellent control. This whole
movement contains lengthy sections that are very sparsely scored
and the concentration with which Petrenko and his players sustain
these passages is superb. The colossal climaxes stand like forbidding
peaks in this long expanse of often-glacial music and the principal
one (16:23 – 17:16) is overwhelming in its power. Immediately
afterwards, the extended, bleak cor anglais solo is hauntingly
eloquent, like a lament in a nuclear winter
In an essay on this symphony, Michael Steinberg quotes the judgement
of Serge Koussevitzky that this first movement “by the power
of its human emotion, surpasses everything else created in our
time.” That’s, presumably, a verdict delivered soon after the
work’s first performances and it’s a view which Koussevitzky
might have modified with the passage of time but I know what
he meant. It’s a shattering creation and I found Petrenko’s
reading of it to be gripping from first note to last. He controls
the pacing of the music and its long lines expertly and it seems
to me that he comprehends and is able to convey the sheer span
of the movement. Indeed, though nothing is rushed he actually
makes the music seem to last for a shorter period of time than
the twenty-five minutes for which it plays.
After such an experience I’d actually recommend the use of the
“pause” button, for though Naxos provide a decent interval between
the first and second movements one really needs a bit of a breather
to gather ones thoughts. The second movement is a grotesque,
dissonant and often strident piece. I’m not quite sure I agree
with the label “bluff though sardonic” that’s applied to it
by Richard Whitehouse in his excellent booklet note. It seems
to me that this is a spiky movement that’s sometimes deliberately
nasty in tone – am I fanciful in imagining a parody of and protest
against a goose-stepping militarism? I admired the precision
of the playing of the RLPO in this movement and the piquant
woodwind playing in the somewhat quieter, less brazen middle
section is very good.
The last three movements play continuously. III is a relentless,
menacing, motoric affair. No conductor that I’ve heard has matched
the implacable savagery of Mravinsky, his strings articulating
their remorseless quavers with biting power. In the aforementioned
essay, Michael Steinberg draws attention to the scream-like
figures that recur throughout the outer sections of the movement
and says “I think every time of the cellars of the Gestapo and
the GPU.” I share his view that this is no scherzo but “a savage
relentless machine”. There is sardonic, wry humour in the post-horn
galop-style trio, in which the RLPO’s trumpeter distinguishes
himself, but when that’s passed the machine returns, even more
brutal in tone than before. It won’t be denied until the music
achieves its visceral climax. Petrenko handles this movement
extremely well.
If anything he’s finer still in the desolate passacaglia that
follows. The soft playing of his string section is outstanding
and later in the movement there are notable contributions from
solo horn, piccolo, flutes and clarinet. Only a few years later
Ralph Vaughan Williams was to write music that is not dissimilar
in scope and ambience in the finale of his Sixth Symphony. On
the evidence of this Shostakovich recording that’s a work that
I’d very much like to hear Petrenko essay before too long. As
was the case in the first movement, the musical and emotional
control exhibited by both conductor and players is admirable.
The finale is a movement that leaves me unsure. I don’t find
it easy to grasp where Shostakovich is going emotionally. The
surface relaxation from minor key desolation to the relative
warmth of a major key might suggest that optimism has finally
asserted itself. But I’m not so sure. There seem to be troubled
undercurrents at several times and how does one reconcile a
more hopeful mood with the arrival at another of those implacably
terrifying climaxes? (8:12 – 9:30) Yet immediately that towering
climax has spent itself the bass clarinet sets off with what
one can only call a sinuous yet quiet dance, in which
a solo violin soon joins. What is one to make of it all? And
then the last three or four minutes bring some semblance of
peace, albeit a somewhat ambiguous, unsure peace. I very much
doubt this was the sort of equivocal conclusion that the Soviet
musical apparatchicks wanted or expected to hear from the Soviet
Union’s leading symphonist during the Great Patriotic War and
so the symphony was misunderstood in the years immediately after
its première just as was the Ninth.
My first encounter with Vasily Petrenko’s Shostakovich cycle
has proved to be a rewarding experience. It seems to me that
he really has the measure of this epic work and he’s conveyed
his vision to the orchestra who reward him with consistently
top quality playing. The recorded sound is very good, as is
the documentation, including an evocative photograph on the
booklet cover, showing the composer at work on this very symphony
in 1943.
This powerful, stirring performance would be a leading library
contender at full price. At the Naxos price its claims on collectors’
attentions are even greater. I eagerly await further instalments
in this cycle, especially the Fourth and Tenth symphonies.
John Quinn
Bob Briggs has also listened to this disc:
I first heard Shostakovich’s 8th Symphony when Arvid Jansons (Mariss’s father) conducted it with the Hallé in Bradford’s St George’s Hall in about 1967. I well remember being bowled over by the sheer size and huge emotional impact of the work. Over the years I’ve heard many performances, both live and in recordings, and my admiration for, and fascination with, the work has only deepened. I have always had a high regard for the Kondrashin and Mravinsky recordings, for they, more than any other, seemed to penetrate to the heart of this very troubled music.
A couple of years ago I had the real pleasure to welcome Petrenko and the RLPO’s performance of the 11th Symphony (Naxos 8.572082) which had a real sweep and verve. Petrenko displayed a superb grasp of the architecture of the music – essential in these huge Symphonies – and brought about one of the best recorded performances of this work. The same is true here.
The long first movement starts with a trenchant attack from cellos and basses, full of anticipation and it’s followed by the most exciting pianissimo! The gradual build-up to the climactic central section – where Shostakovich literally brutalises his music – is as ferocious and vicious as you could want. The final moment of stress – where Shostakovich quotes, for the first time, the Manfred theme (from Tchaikovsky’s work) is quite shattering. Then it all falls away to a very quiet, and most eloquently played, cor anglais lament. This sudden change is very well handled for it is so cruel in its abruptness. After this, but never allowing the tension to drop, the music slowly makes its way to its disturbed ending. The nasty little scherzo which follows is given here in a performance as bland and straightforward as possible, making the perversity of the music all the more prickly. It’s very discomfiting.
The last three movements play without a break and make an imposing edifice. The third movement moto perpetuo is bleak and unforgiving, with unnerving punctuations from high screaming woodwinds. A brief military tattoo cuts across the scene, but it seems like so much hot air, it has no authority, and then we’re back to the endless racing. Again Petrenko builds a gigantic climax, with timpani and drums blasting away as Tchaikovsky’s theme blazes forth in anger; this is quite hair-raising. The ensuing passacaglia is peaceful, if desolate, with beautiful sustained playing from the orchestra. The finale starts in the most bucolic way, with a solo bassoon singing the praises of a simple life and all is sweetness and light. But this is Shostakovich’s great War Symphony so you know that things will take a turn for the worse and sure enough tensions mount and there’s a fierce battle, but I don’t feel the same tension and forward momentum Petrenko displayed in earlier movements when in this situation; the final playing of the Tchaikovsky theme is magnificent but the build-up is too light. However, the quiet coda is excellent, unnerving and disturbing, neither Shostakovich nor Petrenko are going to allow this to be an easy ride into peace.
Apart from this small complaint this is a marvellous performance. Petrenko distances himself, slightly, from the music, and shows us the progress of the music without imposing any personal ideas on it. But this is not an impersonal account, it is a very fine reading and I suspect that, at times, Petrenko had in mind the subsequent political changes which happened in Russian politics after the end of the war, and this has coloured his interpretation. For instance, the trumpet tattoo in the scherzo seems more a snubbing of militarism and blind faith than anything militaristic.
The recording is excellent, full-bodied, and has a very wide dynamic range, the pianissimos being so very, spectacularly, quiet that the climaxes, when they come, are overwhelming. This is a real success.
Bob Briggs
Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra/Vasily Petrenko 
