A PRIMER IN DMITRI SHOSTAKOVICH

I was accidentally introduced to Dmitri Shostakovich at a concert at Leeds City Hall nearly 30 years ago. His Symphony No. 5 was the last on the ticket that I had bought. I initially planned to listen just to the Grieg Piano Concerto and then leave, but I thought, no, I've paid my money, I'll listen to this Russian geezer, who I assumed would be a complete boring arsehole, and if he was then I would do a runner.

I was seriously wrong.

It was Shostakovich's symphony No. 5.

I was gripped from the first bar.

But this is what is lunatic: for the exam in my BSc, the subject I am now researching, I wrote an essay about Shostakovich rather than answer questions on Navier-Stokes Equations.

Anyway, this is Shostakovich Symphony No. 7.

I will here only explain the first movement.

It begins with Soviet Russia in complete harmony, as you would expect; proud, peace, harmony, unity, production. For this was Stalin's Russia. Anyone who said otherwise was killed. But there are a few bars at 4:00 which are very strained, representing the oppression of Stalin. Shostakovich was no mate of Stalin's, rather an opponent, one who was embraced by Wall Street.

But at 6:35 the music changes to represent Operation Barbarossa.

In the symphony, at first the nazis are portrayed as just a bunch of militaristic clowns in the far distance, but very gradually the nazis get closer and closer and closer, until their relentless march leads them to the gates of Leningrad, where Shostakovich was at the time, and to relentless mindless violence and suffering.

But eventually the Nazis are defeated and there is a heroic ending: 3 years of a Nazi blockade!! Ended!!

This is just a brief intro. People often think Russian music is dark and oppressive.

But it can often be the opposite, when you are taught and can be arsed to listen.

This does not glorify Stalinism, rather the triumph of anti-Nazism.

Remember: during WW2 the Russians sacrificed approx 28 million lives to defeat the Nazis, while the USA (whose Wall Street actually created the Nazis in the first place) only lost a half million.