To wrap up the past year, we want to focus on our fantastic releases, and perhaps remind you a few you’ve forgotten!
This year we re-released four volumes of the Russian Disc label’s Shostakovich Film Music Series.
In its heyday in the 1990s, Constantine Orbelian’s Russian Disc label offered many unique and highly prized recordings of Russian repertoire. Among the most successful were four programs of Shostakovich film scores. Although the Russian Disc label closed its doors in the late ’90s, a number of RD titles are still sought-after; and even used copies have escalated in price. In 2010, Delos is re-releasing all four of the Shostakovich Suites from Film Scores recordings, starting with this disc and following with the other three series titles slated for the Spring and Summer of 2010.
Shostakovich is regarded as a pioneer of Soviet film music, and wrote scores for 30 films between 1929 and 1971. Annotator Maya Pritsker points out that in every one of his film scores, Shostakovich “remained a great symphonist, dedicated mostly to the dramatic and expressive… He preferred recreating and evoking emotions to merely making colorful sound pictures.”
Shostakovich Film Series Vol. 1
Suites from the Film Scores The Young Guard and Zoya
Byelorussian Radio and TV Symphony Orchestra
Minsk Chamber Choir
Walter Mnatsakanov, Conductor
DDD • (re-release from Russian Disc) • DRD 2001
Contents: Music from the Film The Young Guard, Op. 75 (1947-8): Introduction • By the River • Scherzo • Turbulent Night • The Song of the Young Guard • Death of the Heroes • Apotheosis• Music from the Film Zoya, Op. 64 (1944): Song About Zoya • Invasion • Execution • Victory • Apotheosis
“.. this is material that is likely not in your collection but should definitely be explored. Shostakovich was one of the best 20th century composers and any of his material is well worth listening to. Highly recommended.” – Film Music: The Neglected Art
Shostakovich Film Series Vol. 2
Music from the Film Alone
Byelorussian Radio and TV
Symphony Orchestra
Minsk Chamber Choir
Walter Mnatsakanov, conductor
Music from the film “Alone” is the second in the highly successful Shostakovich Film Music series, which originally appeared on Russian Disc, and is now being re-released by Delos.
Annotator Maya Pritsker points out that in this score “some of the episodes are quite lengthy and display a truly symphonic development and brilliant use of orchestral resources…We have here an excellent piece of film music, created by the composer in his youthful prime when he was excited at working in a new field…” One of the scenes is reminiscent of “the tragic orchestral interludes of the opera Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District,” which Shostakovich completed shortly after the film Alone was released.
Contents: Music from the Film Alone, Op. 26 (1930-31): Seven Suites, corresponding to the seven parts of the film • 29 tracks
.. The entire work is extremely creative listening, music that is unusual for a soundtrack. While I’ve never seen the film I can only imagine how his music is incorporated into it.
This is one that is going to take a series of repeated listens over a period of days for you to become comfortable with. It like the first release on Delos The Young Guard/Zola /DRD 2001 is a remastering from Russian Disc label recording from 1995. Conductor Mnatsakanov and the Byelorussian Radio and TV Symphony Orchestra seem to have a good grasp on the material…One worth exploring.” – Film Music: The Neglected Art
Shostakovich Film Series Vol. 4
The Lady and The Hooligan
Minsk Symphony Orchestra
Walter Mnatsakanov, conductor
The Lady and The Hooligan(Ballet in one act)
Introduction • Street • The Hooligan • The Lady • School • Prayer • Tavern • Visions • Scene • Promenade in Park • (Allegro) • (Adagio) • Fight • Finale
Ballet Suite No. 2 (1951)
Waltz • Adagio • Polka • Sentimental Romance • Spring Waltz • Finale (Galop)
The Lady and the Hooligan, Volume 4 in the Shostakovich Film Series, is a “choreographic novel” in seven episodes. The 41-minute score is an ingenious tapestry of descriptive music drawn from a number of Shostakovich works. Arranged by Levon Atovmyan, “The Lady and the Hooligan” vividly conveys the characters and their dramatic story, based on a screenplay by Vladimir Mayakovsky.
The more familiar Ballet Sui
te No. 2 is lively and lyrical, playful and ironic, in typical Shostakovich style.
“…I enjoyed this that it will be a CD that I’ll return to from time to time to relisten. You won’t be lulled to sleep as the tragic parts are mixed with the dance material…
… The Ballet Suite No.2, written in 1951, while not for a specific ballet or film is similar in style and orchestration to The Lady and the Hooligan; in fact part of the “Adagio” (Track Twelve) is used. This is a fairly simple easy to listen to work consisting of a galop, polka, waltz, and romantic material. I like it because just when your ears settle into one style of material it changes to another and another. Again I found this a pleasant listening experience.” – Film Music: The Neglected Art
Shostakovich Film Series, Vol. 3
Sofia Perovskaya, Op. 132
Viborg District, Op. 50
The Man with a Gun, Op. 53
The Great Citizen, Op. 52/55
Passer-by, Op. 33
Byelorussian Radio and TV Symphony
Walter Mnatsakanov, conductor
The program on this CD presents a fascinating variety of Shostakovich’s film music, including the recording premiere of the Suite from Sofia Perovskaya.
Distinguished Russian musicologist Levon Hakopian writes in the booklet notes:
“Aesthetically, the music to Sofia Perovskaya is one of Shostakovich’s most accomplished contributions to cinema music… like Katerina Izmailova (Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District), Sofia Perovskaya is portrayed in music with extreme tenderness… for the connoisseurs of Shostakovich’s art it is really great luck to have this remarkable specimen of his late style available on CD.”
Hakopian also comments that the score of Passer-by, “presented on this disc in the form of a concise symphonic suite, is full of variegated ideas, some of which are reminiscent of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 3 written three years earlier. The tune “Song about a Passer-by” crowns the whole.”
“Both the Overture to The Man with a Gun and the Suite from Viborg District are pieces in a heroic mood,” Hakopian says. “Almost all the films Shostakovich scored are nowadays completely forgotten… Yet, Shostakovich’s film scores… continue their own, independent life.”