September 2006   

Sometimes I long for the Good Old Days ~ Don't You?

Happy Birthday Dmitri Shostakovich
September 25, 1906 - August 9, 1975

MOSCOW - It's a rare talent that would make Mstislav Rostropovich feel second-rate in comparison. Dmitri Shostakovich had it.

Rostropovich is among the renowned musicians who will put the wide and contradictory breadth of Shostakovich's vision on full display this month as Russians observe the 100th anniversary of his birth.

The concerts include Rostropovich conducting the Moscow Conservatory's orchestra in Shostakovich's Eighth Symphony.

Ahead of the concert that takes place Monday, the birth anniversary, Rostropovich reminisced about hearing rehearsals of the symphony when he was a Shostakovich pupil at the conservatory in 1943. "To this day, I cannot forget the impression that the Eighth Symphony made on me", he said. "I understood then that I had to stop. I gave up writing music. That was it."

Shostakovich's music stands as a sharp contrast to that of this year's other celebrated musical birthday boy, Wolfgang Mozart, whose hummable strains have drenched the airwaves in observance of the 250th anniversary of his birth. Though Shostakovich's oeuvre isn't without merriment, his most noted works can be forbidding - with dissonances, sometimes-jagged rhythms and flirtations with avant-garde techniques - and they are awash in the troubles that plagued the man and his native land.

Shostakovich is probably best known worldwide for his Seventh and Eighth symphonies, both written during the misery of World War II and both putting the listener through an emotional wringer.

The Seventh, known as the "Leningrad," was hailed as a triumph, a hymn against fascism and a tribute to the suffering wrought by the Nazi blockade of Leningrad, where Shostakovich was born when it was still named St. Petersburg.

A ballet version of that symphony is the centerpiece of a birthday performance by the Mariinsky orchestra and dance company in St. Petersburg. The Eighth is a full hour of bleakness, from the chilling opening notes to the extended quiet fade-out of the end in which sweet and minor harmonies play like a dying soldier thinking of his girlfriend. Audiences had expected something more rousing; Communist authorities did, too, and the symphony was taken out of Soviet orchestras' repertoire until the 1960s.

Like many of his works, it got a warmer reception abroad; its U.S. premiere was broadcast live on more than 130 radio stations. Shostakovich himself said the philosophy behind the symphony "can be expressed in two words: life's wonderful."

Scholars perpetually debate such writings, looking for clues as to what extent Shostakovich's statements were cowed by the Stalinist climate of fear. Shostakovich worked under extraordinary pressure, twice suffering official denunciations - which in many cases, though not his, were precursors to imprisonment, forced exile or even execution.

One of his works was a shocking paradox. His opera "Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk" was well received by authorities after its 1933 premiere, yet three years later the Communist Party mouthpiece Pravda denounced it for "naturalism" and "formalism" - code words for too sexy and too musically complex for the Soviet ideal of the clean-minded proletariat.

His 1935 ballet "Bright Stream" also was attacked, even though its subject should have made any party functionary stand up and applaud: life on a collective farm.

The question remains open as to how much Shostakovich, who showed an attraction to the avant-garde in his youth, throttled back his creative urges. Scholars still puzzle over all his contradictions.

"Shostakovich has been called an abettor of totalitarianism and of dissidence, a cosmopolitan and an exponent of the Russian national soul", Manshir Yakubov, head of the Dmitri Shostakovich Society, wrote in the conservatory's festival program.

Shostakovich's inclination to be topical is one of his attractions, distinguishing him from most of Russia's other top-shelf composers, said Alexei Ratmansky, director of the Bolshoi Ballet,

which is putting on all three of his ballets as part of a birthday festival. "In contrast to Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev and Stravinsky, Shostakovich took his subjects from real life, from what was happening at the time," he said. As examples, he cited the ballets "Bolt", about a disgruntled worker who sabotages a factory machine, and "The Golden Age", about a Soviet soccer team.

Shostakovich joined the Communist Party in 1960 - a move seen variously as patriotic and craven and continued to compose despite ill health aggravated by drinking and smoking. He died in 1975.

The challenging music and the topicality can make him an acquired taste outside Russia.

Many major orchestras aren't marking the birthday and the New York Philharmonic has chosen his most accessible work, the Fifth Symphony, for its commemoration.

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September 21, 2006

    Sell-out crowds prompt extra show

    TORONTO, Sept. 21/ - World famous violinist ANDRE RIEU, and the 
Johann Strauss Orchestra, today announced plans to open a third show in
Toronto at ROGERS CENTRE. Tour and Special Projects Director Kerstin Cornelis
approved the launch of a matinee show on SUNDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2006 AT 3:00 PM.
    "We are encouraged by the support that our Toronto fans have shown us,"
commented Kerstin. "Deciding to add a new show to our schedule was not hard.
Toronto has been one of André's favourite stops and now everyone will have a
chance to experience his wonderful music."
    Rieu, who has toured in countries all over the world is considered an
excellent conductor, a talented violist, and a great showman. Overall, he has
sold more than 20 million albums and CDs and has been at the top of Pollstar's
rankings in global ticket sales. Impromptu dancing in the aisles has also
become a signature of his performances; something normally unheard of with
classical music industry.
    Tickets go on sale on Monday, September 25th at 10:00 a.m. via all
Ticketmaster outlets, including Rogers Centre (Gate 7), charge by phone at
416-872-1111 or online at www.ticketmaster.ca . Tickets are $79.50 and $49.50 plus
applicable Ticketmaster service charges and facility fee. Groups are
encouraged to call 416-341-2255 to reserve their seats.

Information sent by:
Nettie Welton  

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