Another Post on Weinberg and Shostakovich

 Here is the String Quartet No. 8, op. 66 by Weinberg:

And the String Quartet No. 8 by Shostakovich:

I don't even think there is need for a comment.

Weinberg and Shostakovich: Two sides of a coin

I had an odd experience the other day at the Salzburg Festival: I requested a ticket to the Weinberg opera on The Idiot by Dostoevsky and hated it. Nothing odd about that, but I thought I would like it, that it would be interesting. Instead it was just grueling. The odd thing is that Weinberg was a friend and associate of Dmitri Shostakovich who is one of my favorite composers. How could they be so closely associated yet produce such an opposite aesthetic effect? I suppose this is a kind of phenomenological question as I'm just interrogating myself; I'm not doing a survey of listeners in general asking how do you respond to this piece by Shostakovich versus this one by Weinberg. I don't actually care who is more popular, I'm just curious about what the aesthetic differences are from my perspective.

Here is the Symphony No. 12 by Weinberg (written in memoriam of Shostakovich).

I think that previously I didn't listen to Weinberg very closely, just gave him a kind of vague proximity credit for being friends with Shostakovich. But now I listen closely, I see the problem. This music, while being in the same general sonic universe as Shostakovich, is an entirely different take on it. Take the very opening theme: to my ear it is both cruder and sloppier (rhythmically) than Shostakovich would have done. And it is very complicated, which makes it grueling for the listener. As the symphony goes on, this does not improve. It is disquieting, forboding and without relief. I picked that symphony by just typing in "Weinberg" to the search field and picking the first symphony shown. Now let's do the same for Shostakovich. That turns up the Symphony No. 15.

What an utter difference in mood, texture, orchestration! The whole is pervaded by not just expressiveness, but by powerful contrasts in mood from tantalizing to jocular to simply whimsical. And the melodic material is much simpler. There is nothing grim about this. The Weinberg, on the other hand, is pretty much grim all the time--sometimes quiet grim and sometimes loud grim, but always grim. And no Rossini quotes.

I could pick out specific works from each composer, but I rather prefer randomizing the selection as it is more objective. But I will definitely perform this exercise again with different pieces from each composer.

Comments?

Discovering Musicians, Part 4: Mieczysław Weinberg

Dmitri Shostakovich with Mieczysław Weinberg

Mieczysław Weinberg (1919 - 1996) is a composer I have wanted to post about for some time and I'm reminded of him by a post on Norman Lebrecht's blog this morning. Canada's Arc Ensemble has a new recording of chamber music by Weinberg and in connection with it they have created a short animated feature on his life. It's a bit melodramatic, but worth having a look at:

Weinberg has been a strangely neglected composer. As a young man 20 years old, he fled Poland to the Soviet Union where he studied at the conservatory in Minsk. As the Nazi invasion reached there he fled further east and finally ended up in Moscow, where he was befriended by Shostakovich, who regarded his music highly. One of the problems with researching Weinberg is that he is known under several different names. For example, in the index to Laurel Fay's biography of Shostakovich he is listed as Moisey Vainberg. I cannot find part one, but here is the Dudok Quartet with the String Quartet no. 3, op. 14 part two:

In its rich Russian modality, this is not unlike the musical language of Shostakovich, though leaning perhaps in a more lyrical direction. Here is an interesting little talk by David Fanning, the Shostakovich scholar, about Weinberg:

A very compelling question is why Weinberg has been so forgotten--certainly not because he is not a good composer. I think that he has been neglected for much the same reason that Shostakovich was neglected for a long time. When I was an undergraduate music student in the 1970s Shostakovich was never mentioned! The problem with both of them is that they are not following the agenda of 20th century modernism: thou shalt not write tonal music in traditional forms! Now let's hear part of that Requiem that David Fanning was talking about. Here is the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra and Chorus conducted by Thomas Sanderling.

 Finally, let's hear some lighter music by Weinberg. Here is his Concertino, op. 42 for violin and string orchestra:

He wrote a great deal of music, as much as Shostakovich, so we have a lot to explore!