cd

RUSSIAN ROMANCES

for solo voices and orchestra
DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH

2CD-Set · C5095 PC: 21 UPC: 845221050959

FOMINA · SINJAWSKAJA · KASATSCHUK · KOTSCHERGA
KÖLNER RUNDFUNK-SINFONIE-ORCHESTER
MICHAIL JUROWSKI, conductor



DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH

3 Romances on poems by Alexander Pushkin op.46a
for bass and small orchestra
From Jewish folk poetry op.79
Song cycle for soprano, alto, tenor and orchestra
Six Romances on Verses by English Poets opus 62 / 140
for bass and small orchestra
Suite on verses by Michelangelo Buonarroti op.145
for bass and orchestra
6 Romances on words by Japanese poets op.21 for tenor and orchestra
6 Poems by Marina Tsvetayeva op.143a for alto and small orchestra

For a composer of vocal music in a totalitarian state such as the former
Soviet Union, the very choice of poet was itself a declaration of commitment which – quite apart from the content – was linked to the life of the writer and above all his ideological evaluation by the Party. In his song-cycles, Shostakovich, a virtuoso in eloquent rhetoric behind the facade of beating the drum for Communism, made masterly use of the symbolic resonances of names such as Pushkin who hated the Tsars, or the Futurist Alexander Blok, or Shakespeare's timeless critique of power, or the Jewish culture that was so brutally suppressed after the War.

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