Shostakovich: Sofia Perovskaya and other Film Music
Byelorussian Radio & TV Symphony/Walter Mnatsakanov
Delos 2003
Recording:   ****/****
Performance: ****/****

This Delos release from the “Shostakovich Film Series” (evidently volume 3) makes available a classic recording of one of his later scores from 1968, Sofia Perovskaya, with several selections from his film music of the 1930s.

The brief selection from Viborg District (1938) serves as an energetic overture.  This is followed by the relatively exciting music for another film from that year, The Man With a Gun.  The five-movement suite features music that has the sort of exciting energy of the Festive Overture with some of the heroic sounds of the symphonies.  There are plenty of brass fanfares that kick off these various selections often opening in orchestral unisons and moving into large orchestral interplay with dotted rhythms the norm in a mostly noisy score that is intended to satisfy the Soviet watchdogs of the time and is reminiscent of the shrill moments from the Twelfth Symphony.  The suite is followed by the moving “Funeral March” from The Great Citizen which is surely one of the finer pieces from the composer’s film scoring output (though Riccardo Chailly’s performance on a compilation from Decca is a bit warmer performance than the one here).  Also familiar will be the three movements of music from Counterplan, Op. 33 (called Passer-by here with three numbered movements).  This 1932 work (with an almost Prokofiev-like sound and wit) is another of the composer’s more interesting works and features the famous “Song of the Meeting”.  Each of these comes from this period of Soviet Realism in the arts and a time when Shostakovich was trying to navigate the changing political climate.

While the waltz from Sofia Perovskaya has had a concert life of its own, this is apparently one of the only recordings of the rest of the score.  The film is about a woman activist who was responsible for the assassination of Czar Alexander II on March 1, 1881.  Bearing a resemblance to the strong feminist thread of Shostakovich’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District, this score is one of the composer’s finest.  Shostakovich was able to explore a bit more fully that combination of satiric wit and tragedy that was a hallmark of his style.  We see this as early as the opening march.  There is also great tenderness in his thematic treatment of Sofia.  Shostakovich scores much of the film rather sparsely with percussion or trumpets carrying the drama and creating a great deal of tension.  The subtle and ghostly female chorus for “The Village” is also quite moving in a very eerie way.  It is in these simpler textures where we get a sense of the power of Shostakovich’s music when simple themes appear with deep emotional connections in the score apart from the more brittle and brash percussion and trumpet calls.  The importance of the waltz as the core of the score becomes apparent as the rest of the music unfolds casting references back to it from time to time.  The performance is quite sensitive and overall a real highlight of the disc.

The Byelorussian Orchestra is a bit over-shrill at times in the earlier works (but stylistically it is appropriate) with a very closely-recorded dry acoustic perhaps mostly to blame.  But Mnatsakanov proves to be a sympathetic conductor to Shostakovich’s style as he shapes the slower musical moments recorded here with a tenderness that is exquisite.  In short, a fine release for Shostakovich fans that is good to have in the catalog.

Shostakovich: The Lady & the Hoologan; Ballet Suite No. 2
Minsk Symphony Orchestra/Walter Mnatsakanov
Delos 2004
Recording:   ***/****
Performance: ****/****

Delos is “Shostakovich Film Series” is making available several sought after Russian Disc recordings from the 1990s of which this is the third album to be released so far this year.  The primary work on the disc is The Lady and the Hooligan.  The 1962 ballet in one act was conceived by choreographer K. Boyarsky to a libretto by A. Belinsky.  The story comes from a poor film whose screenplay was written by Vladimir Mayakovsky.  Shostakovich wrote only three ballets though many later would take his music and rearrange it for use in other ballet settings. 

Levon Atovmyan compiled and arranged the music that appears in this work.  He borrowed music from the ballet suites, The Bolt, The Limpid Stream, the Cello Sonata, and the familiar “Romance” from The Gadfly.  For Shostakovich fans, having this unusual release to hear the composer’s music in this context might be a bit unsettling at first but the infectious playing of the Minsk Symphony under conductor Walter Mnatsakanov is often quite captivating.  The recording was made in a studio and has a rather dry acoustic though not entirely without a little ambient reverb.  Surprisingly the work is overall more coherent than one would have expected and feels far more like a lost film score than a ballet (no doubt due to its recorded sound).  Highlights include the drunken “Tavern” based on a tango from The Bolt, and “Visions” which comes from The Gadfly “Romance”—played first on solo clarinet quite beautifully.   The booklet notes guide the listener through the borrowings somewhat but for the most part you just let the music bubble along without much care for where it came from making this a surprisingly fun discovery.    

The second Ballet Suite also has a film connection as Shostakovich used music from his score to Michurin for the “Spring Waltz.”  There are good recordings of the complete suites elsewhere with this one being the least represented.  The 1951 work is constructed of six movements filled with much lively energy with a beautifully wrought “Adagio” with its expressive lyricism and the mildly ironic “Sentimental Romance.”  But for the most part this is all great fun.

The performances here are committed with Mnatsakanov proving to be an apt conductor at shaping these various threads with some nuance and subtlety.  While some of Shostakovich’s film music is utilized in both works on this release, these really fall more in the ballet category which will disappoint those who think they stumbled on a resurrected and unknown film score.  The recording itself is a challenge at times with the dry sound sometimes deadening the richness of the ensemble.  The music at times segues into subsequent tracks without a break as well.  It is really only in the large orchestral climaxes where the recording suffers and these are few and far between that it does not distract from the overall enjoyment of the music here.  The fault of the recording has more to do with the source than with Delos itself.  Recommended for Shostakovich completists and those looking for slightly improved sound over the original CDs.