INDELIBLE VISIONS
OF A TROUBLED WORLD

BILL NEWMAN discusses the Emersons' new recording
of the complete Shostakovich works for string quartet

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What can one add to what has been written about the eighth quartet (again 1960) with its dedication to the memory of victims of war and fascism? [Listen, CD 3 track 5, 0:00 - 0:38.] When the work was assigned to the department of 'exposing fascism', the composer blatantly expostulated 'You have to be blind to do that...everything in it is as clear as a primer [quoting themes from 'Lady Macbeth', Symphonies 1 and 5] ... what does fascism have to do with these? ... it quotes a song known to all Russians - exhausted by the hardships of prison.' Regarded by the composer as autobiographical, it has become the most often performed of his quartets, Shostakovich's DSCH repeated pattern recurring throughout. Finckel's comments are very relevant: 'It's very sarcastic, and almost funny, but not quite.'

Pressure of work on his Symphony 13 had caused the composer to ease up, with travel, teaching, rehearsals, performances and attendances at Composer Union meetings adding to his burdens. In a fit of depression and self-criticism he consigned the first version of Quartet No.9 to the stove. Based on themes from childhood, the rewrite three years later dedicated to his new wife Irina Supinskaya, editor and literary scholar is a large complex work, themes growing out of each other throughout the five interconnected movements. Mussorgsky is once again quoted in the psalm-like fourth [listen, CD 3 track 13, 1:28 - 2:16]. The apparent simplicity at the start of Quartet No.10 (the same year) is similarly structured, now over four movements, although its mood shifts embrace nervousness, throbbing chords, falling cello and spiralling violin melodies, brutality and a passacaglia metamorphosed (3rd movement) which re-appears (4th movement) alongside some hysterical counterpoint treatment of the opening movement's main melody. At the close, the music disappears into a state of silence [listen, CD 3 track 17, 7:42 - 8:40].

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