2nd Symphony Concert: FROM SHADOW TO LIGHT

“Chaos instead of music” was the damning headline under which Dmitri Shostakovich’s opera Lady Macbeth of Mzensk was slammed in the Soviet newspaper "Pravda" in 1936. In the Soviet Union, such a state-sanctioned denunciation was never just an artistic dispute but represented an existential threat to the composer.

The fact that the premiere of Shostakovich’s 5th Symphony was unanimously celebrated by both the public and state representatives the very next year was tantamount to rehabilitation after the prior scandal. For Shostakovich, the solemn praise from the Soviet party leadership was likely just another dose of the same poison.

At the same time, one does have to ask what exactly the party leadership heard in the grimly desperate marches and the grotesquely distorted "Per aspera ad astra" dramaturgy. Mstislav Rostropovich called the finale, which seemed to race over with jubilation, a “triumph for idiots.” Shostakovich himself commented on the speculations about possible interpretations of his music with his characteristic laconic phrase: “Just listen to my music, everything is said in it.”

Tickets from 26,00 €