cd/dvd releases

SHOSTAKOVICH - Symphony No 10

WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln - Avie

After hearing Semyon Bychkov’s searing live performance of Shostakovich’s 10th Symphony with the San Francisco Symphony and reviewing his performance of the 11th Symphony I was looking forward to hearing his version of the enigmatic 4th Symphony. I was not disappointed.

Bychkov conducts it with intensity, excitement, tenderness and tranquillity and the WDR Symphony performs it superbly. The sound is close, but not without sufficient reverberation. Highly recommended!
Audiophile.com, April 07

SHOSTAKOVICH - Symphony No 4

WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln - Avie

The Shostakovich centenary has thrown up many perspectives on his life and music, but the work most deserving of the spotlight has remained largely in the shadows. The Fourth Symphony, one of his most enigmatic creations, hints at new creative directions that were thwarted by Stalinist criticism - the criticism that forced this work to lie in a drawer for 25 years. Bychkov instinctively understands its sprawling language, wrestles with its structural challenges and draws wonderfully biting responses from the Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra.
Financial Times, November 06

Classical CD of the Week: Shostakovich: Symphony No 4
The Fourth Symphony — completed in 1936, but not publicly performed until 1961 — was withdrawn by Shostakovich in the wake of the attack, in Pravda, on the supposedly “formalist” composer. This followed Stalin’s disapproving visit to the hugely successful Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District in December 1935, 200 performances after its 1934 premiere in Leningrad. It is perhaps Shostakovich’s most avant-garde symphony, very much in the anarchic, tragicomic spirit of the opera (which the Soviets banned), cast in three movements whose wild divergences of tempo and mood would not have found favour in the conservative artistic circles around the Russian dictator. Although less popular than its more “classical” successor, the Fifth, the Fourth’s reputation continues to grow, despite its bizzareries. In the fourth of his series of studio recordings of Shostakovich symphonies, made after repeated live performances in Cologne, Bychkov (above) reveals himself as one of the most compelling Shostakovich interpreters of our time. The playing of his Cologne radio orchestra is more refined than that of the best Russian orchestras today, and his grasp of the music’s dramatic and emotional power has few equals.
The Sunday Times, September 06