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Title: Testimony: The Memoirs of Dmitri Shostakovich by Dmitrii Dmitrievich Shostakovich, Solomon Volkov, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Antonina W. Bouis ISBN: 0-87910-998-X Publisher: Limelight Editions Pub. Date: 01 January, 2004 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $20.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.38 (13 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: This book is no fake...The discrediting has been discredited
Comment: Although numerous assaults have taken place against testimony, as if Dmitri Shostakovich had offered his heart on a platter in his film scores but not in the 4th quartet, _Testimony_ has managed to come out the victor amidst the barrage. In addition to the fact that Shostakovich's (or "Shostakovich's", if you skeptics prefer) words coincide so well with the music, I have read various collections of evidence pro Testimony- I think that dozens and dozens of quotations from colleagues of Shostakovich (including his daughter and son) attesting to the truthfulness of Testimony are better evidence than the pedantic date-mincing of cynics who had never met the man.
With all of this further defense of the book aside, I must say that this is a fine book, and it is finer still if you will accept the words within as fact. Read all of the mud-slinging regarding Testimony first if you wish, but with all of it aside this book is a fine work of fact, and would even be a fine work of fiction.
Although pedants may be quite blind to the fact, this book is rather moving, at times humourous, at times starkly observant... One who does not adore Shostakovich's music would do well to read the book, for one gains a great psychological perspective into what are merely very good works when viewed as 'absolute music'.
Rating: 5
Summary: An indispensable document
Comment: Testimony is 276 pages of a "shackled genius" (as Solzhenitsyn described him) being truly and 100% candid for the first time in his adult life. Compiled through interviews with the much-maligned Solomon Volkov, Shostakovich requested that they be published "after my death, after my death" for good reason.
For the more casual reader, a fabulous read; gripping, powerful, shattering. And educational, too.
For the historian or musicologist, one sees through "Testimony" the society Shostakovich and his colleagues lived in, and composed in.
For the musician, the groundwork is laid for gaining insight to Shostakovich the person, and thus the basic aspects of the composer's music: bitterness, sarcasm, satire, quotation, and a very direct, pointed language.
To consider the controversy regarding this book's "authenticity," I direct your attention to Ho & Feofanov's "Shostakovich Reconsidered," which is a truly enlightening work, both about "Testimony" and Shostakovich in general. Elizabeth Wilson's book is remarkable, too.
Rating: 5
Summary: It's All There In The Music
Comment: There is no question that this book represents the authentic
thoughts of Dmitry Shostakovich (DDS), the greatest composer of the Twentieth Century. There is no question his music is the one the most profound artistic forms of dissidence against the evil regime of the USSR that was ever produced. It is all there in the music, and as DDS himself said "He who has ears, will hear!"
Some examples:
Symphony No. 4 - written in 1936, after the horrors of farm collectivization and the first 5-year plan ("2+2=5"). Opens with a shriek of pain and is very cacophanous.
Symphony No. 5 - written in 1937, the height of the Great Terror.
Ends what seems to be triumphant note (like a speech which ends with "Long Live Comrade Stalin and the Communist Party of the USSR!"), but if played correctly, sounds like someone is being beaten over the head and told to rejoice against his will.
Symphony No. 7 - The famous "Leningrad symphony" has a march tune which ignorant apparatchiks said represents the approach of the German Army, but since it is in a major key and is most definitely NOT a military march, really represents the sweetness and light that Communism promises at first, but which later ends up becoming a nightmare.
Symphony No. 8 - The third movement represents (in my opinion) an agitprop session beating propaganda into people's heads.
Symphony No. 9 - written at the end of the war, instead of being a grotesque paean of praise to Stalin as was expected, has a light, humorous opening saying the joke is on all those who thought the situation in the USSR would improve after the war.
Symphony no. 12 - a piece in "praise" of Lenin. Sounds "bad"
and uninspired, but that was DDS's intention in saying what he really thinks about Lenin.
Symphony No. 13 - the "Babi Yar" symphony, openly dissident work
condemning state and personal anti-Semitism.
In this book, DDS tells us what he was trying to say in these pieces and others. His courage along with his self-admitted weaknesses make him a compelling figure in history. Read this and see how a hero coped living in one of the most nightmarish regimes in history.
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Title: Shostakovich by Elizabeth Wilson ISBN: 0691044651 Publisher: Princeton University Press Pub. Date: 21 August, 1995 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: Shostakovich and Stalin : The Extraordinary Relationship Between the Great Composer and the BrutalDictator by SOLOMON VOLKOV ISBN: 0375410821 Publisher: Knopf Pub. Date: 23 March, 2004 List Price(USD): $30.00 |
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Title: Story of a Friendship: The Letters of Dmitry Shostakovich to Isaak Glikman, 1941-1975 by Dmitry Shostakovich, Isaak Glikman, Anthony Phillips ISBN: 0801439795 Publisher: Cornell University Press Pub. Date: 01 October, 2001 List Price(USD): $36.00 |
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Title: Shostakovich: A Life by Laurel E. Fay ISBN: 0195134389 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 November, 1999 List Price(USD): $42.00 |
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Title:Dmitry Shostakovich: Symphonies - WDR Symphony Orchestra / Rudolf Barshai ASIN: B000067F6C Publisher: Brilliant Classics Pub. Date: 28 May, 2002 List Price(USD): $57.98 Comparison N/A, buy it from Amazon for $57.98 |
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