Symphony No.8, Op.65

Adagio

Allgretto

Allegro non troppo -

Largo -

Allegretto

It is true that Shostakovich wrote his Eighth Synphony at the height of the last war in 1943, after had had been evacuatd from Leningrad and at about the same time as th battle of Stalingrad. It is also true that the symphony at one time actually bore the sutbtitle of “Stalingrad” as though the composer wanted to present it is a sequel to the patriotic and phenomenally successful Seventh Symnphony dedicatd to the beleagured City of Leningad. However, the Eighth Synphony has much more in common with the pre-war Fifth than the “Leningrad” symphony and, a greater work than any of its predecessors in purely musical trms, it gains nothing from a programmatic intepretation. If the symphony has any general meaning the clues are to be found in the music itself, in the conflict of tonalities and in the melodic and stylistic allusions.

The Eighth Symphony opens in C minor, very much in the way the Fifth opens in D minor, with a motif in fierce double-dotted rhythms forcing itself upwards from basses to second violins. Still in the Adagio tempo the first violins enter with a whisper of a more lyrical variant which is then developed, at first by itself and then in combination with the original motif. Just as in the Fifth Symphony, the second subject is introduced by first vioins at a quicker tempo over a throbbing rhythm in the rest of the strings, in this case in quintuple time and in E minor.

But in the Eighth Symphony the two tempi are more thoroughly integrated than in the Fifth. The Adagio material is reintroduced at an early stage and - at the height of the one of the most sustained and most powerful climaxes in the history of the symphony - its if firmly associated with the second subject, passionately uttered in canon by trumpets and trombones. They are associated again in two quicker section of no less intensity - the dotted rhythms on the strings, the second subject on the horns, the once whispered first-subject-variant now shouted by trumpets and trombones together. As the tempo changes to Adagio again for the recapitulation, the intensity is sustained by drum rolls over which, and accompanied by explosive trills and tremolandos, trumpets and trombones recall the dotted rhythms and combine it with an obviously deliberate allusion to the tragic “fate” motif from Tchaikovsky’s Manfred. The cor anglais meditates at length before reintroducing the second subject in C major, the key in which the movement consolingly ends.

In this context the D flat major key of the Allegretto is so distant as to be unreal. In fact, this second movement is a heavily ironic scherzo, but in a sort of sonata form with a first subject related to the dotted-rhythm morif of the previous movement and a brilliantly skittish second subjewct for woodwind. On the other hand, the allegro non tropppo in e minor 9a key anticipated in the first movement0 is very relaistic. perhaps it is too realistic for comfort in its heav-footed pursuit of screaming woodwind and brass and in the grotesquely incongruous toy-soldier middle section.

The pursuit theme runs straight into the fourth movemen, again by way of a drum roll, over which the whole orchestra converts the screams of the Allegro non tropppo into the dotted-rhythm motif of the opening Adagaio. The motif remains throught the Largo as the ground bass of a psssacaglia with melodic counterpoints from violins and violas, solo horn, piccolo, and clarinet.

The direct transition from the Largo to the C major beginning of the final Allegretto is one of the most beautifully contrived moments in the symphony. The bassoon introduces the main theme and it seems that the troubles are over. Indeed, as the theme goes through its several variations (in turn for flute, cellos in waltz rhythm, oboe, violins, falstaffian lkower wind and strings in coutnerpoint later with violins, strings and then woodwind in fugue, brasss in fanfares) there is no trouble at all. However, with the gradual acceleration in tempo and rise in the dynamic level, something of the former intensity returns and, eventually and highly dramatically, so do the Adagio explosions and Manfred’s fate motif from the first movement.

So what happens now? Shostakovich’s happy answer is to recall the more jocular and engaging of the Allegretto variations and to allow the movement to fade away in a soothing C major Andante.

Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)

Cello Sonata in C Op.65 (1960-61)

Dialogo: Allegro

Scherzo-pizzicato: Allegretto

Elegia: Lento

Marcia: Energico

Moto perpetuo: Presto

The Sonata in C was the first of of the five remarkable works, including also the Cello Symphony and the three solo Suites, that Britten wrote for Mstislav Rostropovich. He had known the Russian cellist for only a few a few weeks when he started on the score. They had first met at an early performance of Shostakovich’s First Cello Concerto in the Royal Festival Hall in September 1960 when, obviously, he didn’t know him as well as he would by the time he wrote the Third Suite, a quintessentially Rostropovich inspiration, ten years later. Even so, in spite of a certain nervousness which is as apparent in the music as it evidently was when ‘Slava’ and ‘Beninka’ first played through the Sonata together, much of the cellist’s personality is reflected here.

Like most of the rest the work, the first movement represents the mercurial rather than the expansive Rostropovich. Entitled Dialogo, it opens with an exchange of single notes or tiny phrases which, although the two instruments seem out of step with each other, actually adds up to a theme on two levels – the fragmented line of the cello combined with a rising and falling scale on the piano. The theme is more clearly defined a little later when, against a vigorously buzzing ostinato on the cello, the piano assumes responsibility for both elements and authoritatively reshapes them as a kind of second subject. It reappears in yet another shape in the recapitulation, again on the piano and again against a cello ostinato but now without the scalic element and in a tranquil mood that survives to the attenuated end.

Intentionally or not, the eerily scored Scherzo, in which the cellist plays pizzicato throughout, is a tribute to Bartók in night-music mode (specifically the Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion). After the expressive, virtually monthematic Elegia with its passionate central climax, the Marcia pays another tribute: an intrusion from suite-form on the four-movement pattern of the conventional sonata, it is an aggressively grotesque march of the kind familiar in the work of Rostropovich’s compatriots Prokofiev and, more particularly, Shostakovich. There is more mercurial scoring for the cello in the closing Moto Perpetuo, a brilliantly witty invention ending in a rackety fortissimo recall of the main theme in double octaves on the piano and another octave on the cello.

Dmitri Shostakovich    (1906-1975)

Cello Sonata in D minor Op.40 (1934)

Allegro non troppo – Largo

Allegro

Largo

Allegro

The Cello Sonata in D minor was written at a difficult time in the composer’s life. The problem was not political – Shostakovich’s first major upset in this respect, to be signalled by Stalin’s denunciation of his opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, was just round the corner – but personal. In the summer of 1934, angered by an affair he was involved in, his wife Nina had left him and, although they were soon to be reunited, his emotions were in turmoil. It was not an unfruitful experience however: working through two sleepless nights, he produced the first movement of a promised Sonata for his cellist friend Victor Kubatsky. The work was completed within a few weeks and first performed by Kubatsky and the composer before the end of the year.

There is little evidence of sleepless turmoil in the opening bars which, with their gently arpeggiated D minor harmonies in the piano part and the elegant line of the first subject on the cello, express nothing more anguished than the urbane melancholy of a Gabriel Fauré. Although the atmosphere does become progressively more agitated, it settles into tranquillity when, after a demonstratively contrived modulation, the piano introduces its serenely lyrical second subject. The cello takes up the new theme and the passion rises but only to be stilled at the end of the exposition by a staccato rhythmic figure low in the left hand of the piano. That figure is not as harmless as it seems. It is to be heard nagging away at some level of the texture throughout the development and is silenced only when the piano, again with the approval of the cello, offers a reminder of the serenity of the second subject. As though in acknowledgement of the unreality of this apparently peaceful situation, there is a pause and the tempo drops to Largo for a recall of the first subject at less than half its original tempo on a muted and inconsolable cello, the rhythmic figure echoing in the left hand of the piano in the closing bars.

The Allegro second movement is a characteristically primitive scherzo, its outer sections driven by vigorous ostinato rhythms. The middle section is more fancifully coloured by glissando harmonics on the cello against a legato melody in octaves on the piano except, that is, where the roles are reversed or where the piano briefly restores the aggressive articulation. For all its ferocity, however the scherzo seems to be no more than interlude introduced to offset the profoundly contemplative Largo in B minor. It begins with a short soliloquy for muted cello which lights, just after the first entry of the piano, on a pathetic little motif of a descending minor third once repeated. Although the main theme of the movement is the one introduced by the cello (now unmuted) over a rhythmic accompaniment on the piano, that little motif returns to haunt the movement both in the middle, before the piano reintroduces the main theme, and in the bereft closing bars.

Although the final Allegro confirms the D minor tonality established by the first movement, it does so in a in a very much less troubled frame of mind. Cast as a rondo with well contrasted episodes – the last of them putting the piano through a rigorous exercise in moto perpetuo -– it seems to be due for a quiet, even happy ending until the short sharp shock of the closing bars.

Gerald Larner © 2018