Shostakovich: Symphony No.7 (Mariss Jansons) (CD, Br-Klassik)

DMITRIJ SHOSTAKOWITSCH SYMPHONY NO. 7 LENINGRADER Dmitrij Shostakovich was one of the most important composers of the 20th century; He has shaped the repertoire with his works, especially his fifteen symphonies, which are indebted to late Romantic music and which brought it to modern times. His aesthetic is determined by the effects of the Second World War as well as the political conditions of the Stalinist Soviet Union, under which he had to work and to which he had to make concessions. His Symphony No. 7 in C major, Op. 60, was written in the war year 1941, which is roughly in the middle of his symphonic uvre; it was nicknamed the Leningrad Symphony because it was dedicated to Shostakovich in his hometown of Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg again). The march theme of the first movement was created before the beginning of the German-Soviet War, around 1939 or 1940. He created the other movements in Leningrad, which was besieged by German troops from September 8, 1941; the symphony was finally completed in Kuibyshev (Samara) on the Volga after Shostakovich and his family had been evacuated from Leningrad on October 1, 1941. The premiere took place there on March 5, 1942, with the musicians of the Moscow Bolshoi Theater orchestra, which was also evacuated there, under the direction of Samuil Samossud. The Moscow premiere on March 27th took place under life-threatening circumstances, but even an air alarm, in view of the captivating music, could not induce the audience to go to the shelters. Little has changed in this fascination with music to this day: his Seventh Symphony is Shostakovich’s best-known work. Mariss Jansons, who died in 2019 and was regarded as an expert in the Slavic repertoire as well as symphonic music of the 19th and 20th centuries, had repeatedly grappled with this masterpiece. The recording, which was published here for the first time on CD, was recorded in concerts from the Philharmonie im Gasteig on February 11 and 12, 2016. Under Janson’s direction, the musicians of the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks interpret Shostakovich’s Seventh Symphony as a shocking testimony to the times, but also make it an expression of our contemporary era.