{"id":1741,"date":"2020-05-03T13:10:25","date_gmt":"2020-05-03T17:10:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/?p=1741"},"modified":"2020-05-03T13:10:28","modified_gmt":"2020-05-03T17:10:28","slug":"shostakovich-and-the-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/2020\/05\/shostakovich-and-the-state.html","title":{"rendered":"Shostakovich and the State"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed-youtube wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"SHOSTAKOVICH and the STATE\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/bYULxjU76Ag?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cPeople underestimate Stalin\u2019s level of control,\u201d says Solomon Volkov. \u201cI once started to calculate how many people in the arts Stalin controlled&nbsp;<em>personally<\/em> &#8212; that is, read their writing, listened to their music, attended their performances. And it was close to one thousand. And not in some abstract way. This was an incredible, unprecedented amount of attention to the arts, which was Stalin\u2019s habit. So that Shostakovich knew very well that he was under the constant observation of this most powerful person in the country.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.postclassical.com\">PostClassical Ensemble<\/a><\/strong> today continues its Sunday series of \u201cMore than Music\u201d videos, in collaboration with&nbsp;<strong>The American Interest&nbsp;<\/strong>and WWFM The Classical Network.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cShostakovich and the State\u201d presents commentary by Solomon Volkov, author of\u00a0<em>Testimony: The Memoirs of Dmitri Shostakovich<\/em> (1979). The musical focus is Shostakovich\u2019s String Quartet No. 8 (1960): a unique autobiographical document, capturing a moment both personally and historically fraught. The composer\u2019s musical signature &#8212; the four-note motif D, E-flat, C, B \u2013 begins and pervades the entire work. Though inscribed to \u201cthe victims of fascism,\u201d it is at the same time an encoded narrative of harrowing decades of Stalinist oppression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Eighth Quartet is also well-known in a string-orchestra version created by Rudolf Barshai. This PostClassical Ensemble video features a terrific concert performance led by Angel Gil-Ord\u00f3\u00f1ez (at 6:10), prefaced and followed by Volkov\u2019s remarks. As a young man, Volkov wrote the first review of the Eighth Quartet \u2013 it became his ticket of introduction to the famous composer. He tells this story, and also talks (at 2:55) about Stalin as culture-tsar.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you\u2019re interested in taking part in a live&nbsp;<strong>Zoom chat<\/strong> with myself, Solomon Volkov, and Angel Gil-Ord\u00f3\u00f1ez, click <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/postclassical.com\/registration-form\/\">here<\/a><\/strong>. (This event is free, but registration is required.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Next Sunday\u2019s installment: Behrouz Jamali\u2019s PCE film \u201cShostakovich in Time of War,\u201d juxtaposing musical responses to World War II by Stravinsky, Prokofiev, and Shostakovich.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cPeople underestimate Stalin\u2019s level of control,\u201d says Solomon Volkov. \u201cI once started to calculate how many people in the arts Stalin controlled&nbsp;personally &#8212; that is, read their writing, listened to their music, attended their performances. And it was close to one thousand. And not in some abstract way. This was an incredible, unprecedented amount of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1741","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2QLHN-s5","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1741"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1741\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1746,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1741\/revisions\/1746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/uq\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}