Mieczslaw Weinberg
(more frequently seen in the Russian
variant as Moise Vainberg - or ‘Vaynberg’
if you look at the 1980 New Grove) was
born in Warsaw, the son of a violinist
and composer working in the Polish theatre.
In 1941, a fateful year, he moved to
the USSR, at first to Minsk, then to
Tashkent. His First Symphony resulted
in an invitation to Moscow by Shostakovich.
The two became close and had a relationship
of mutual trust and friendship under
which they shared views on draft compositions
and supported each other through the
most testing of times. Vainberg was
in fatal peril in 1953 when his name
became linked with a campaign to make
a Jewish state out of the Crimea. Shostakovich's
intervention saved him from the gulags
or a bullet in the back of the head.
The Fifth Symphony
has not previously been recorded.
The work emerged in 1962 influenced
by the first performance, after a long
suppression, of Shostakovich's Fourth
Symphony. It is dedicated to Kondrashin,
a lifelong Vainberg champion, who conducted
the premiere of the Shostakovich work
and recorded it for Melodiya shortly
afterwards. Alistair Wightman comments,
in his notes, on the similarities between
the music of Shostakovich and Vainberg.
The four movement Symphony is indeed
bleak, has its moments of soured triumph
threaded through with disillusion. There
is a beleaguered comfort about the fine
tenderly plangent adagio sostenuto
which is I think more powerful than
anything in Shostakovich 4. It bridges
across to the tense adagios of the Roy
Harris symphonies of the 1930s and 1940s.
Tension bursts the bonds at 9.01 when
the tender theme thrusts forward with
all the torque of a supercharged spiritual;
impressive by anyone's reckoning. The
impishly playful flute and then other
solo wind instruments seem to dance
in macabre delicacy in the shortish
allegro. This soon takes on a
distinctly Shostakovichian edginess
and dazzle before restively petering
out into silence from which emerges
attacca a pastoral finale. This
becomes increasingly impassioned in
the raucous style of Markevitch and
Mossolov at one point (5.54). All in
all this is a deeply serious symphony
which hardly ever drops its guard.
There are twenty two
symphonies, two sinfoniettas, seventeen
string quartets, seven operas and much
else. The First of the two Sinfoniettas
is included. It is in four compact movements.
Scorchingly knockabout uproar, steppe
pomp, Armenian lyricism (tr.6 1.56)
and Yiddish character (e.g. the clarinet
solo in the allegretto) are the order
of the day. Both material and treatment
are more instantly accessible than in
the much later symphony. Surprisingly
the French Horn solo that initiates
the Lento is played with all
the liquid Slavonic style we have come
to expect from the heyday of Soviet
orchestras under Mravinsky, Ivanov and
Golovanov.
Olympia have done a
superb job of making many hours of Vainberg
available. I rather hope that Chandos
will think of filling the gaps left
in the symphony cycle by Olympia rather
than duplicating their work.
Due to the work of
Claves, Russian Disc and Olympia there
is now or has been quite a lot of Vainberg
in the catalogue although so much of
it depends on Olympia. Chandos are set
to make a major and enduring contribution
if this disc is anything to go by. Don't
let this one slip into the background
and don’t imagine that Vainberg is some
second league Shostakovich. He has his
own perspective and his motivating sharpness,
invective, Russian passion and desolation
are distinctively his own.
A classic entry. Don't
miss it if you have a taste for tragic
symphonic statements.
Rob Barnett
Many thanks to my good
friend Jacques Kleyn for pointing out
that the Chandos CD of Weinberg's Fifth
Symphony is NOT its first appearance
on CD. The Symphony No. 5 and the Trumpet
Concerto were recorded on Russian Disc
in performances conducted by Kirill
Kondrashin. Now those are performances
I would also like to hear. RB
National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra,
Katowice/Gabriel Chmura 
