SHOSTAKOVICH: Complete Songs Volume 4
Shostakovich: Complete Songs Volume 4, 1932-68 (DE 3313)
This fourth installment in Delos’ projected 5-volume Shostakovich Complete Songs CD set fills in various gaps between 1932 and 1968 not covered in the other recordings. The familiar singers include Victoria Evtodieva, Fyodor Kuznetsov and Liudmila Shkirtil, directed by pianist and redoubtable musical authority Yuri Serov. Subtitled “Unknown Shostakovich,” the recording includes songs from motion pictures, Satires set to words by Sasha Chorny, and the unusual Anti-Formalistic Raree Show, a single act satiric opera/cantata created in response to the repressive resolutions passed by the Communist Party Central Committee in 1948. It vividly illustrates and comments on the political and artistic climate of the time.
The music on this disc cannot be viewed apart from the era in which Shostakovich lived and worked. These pieces form an integral part of the total song output of this great Russian composer.
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