Search - Dmitry Shostakovich, Adriano, Moscow Symphony Orchestra :: Shostakovich: The Fall of Berlin, Op. 82; The Unforgettable Year 1919, Op. 89a

Representative selections of Shostakovich film music

Larry VanDeSande | Mason, Michigan United States | 02/07/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975) played and composed film music, or music to accompany cinema, from his earliest days as a teen pianist accompanying silent movies. He composed the two scores on this CD -- "The Fall of Berlin" and "The Unforgettable Year 1919" -- in the postwar period after his 1948 denunciation, with Prokofiev and every other good composer in USSR, as a formalist. Film music was a way for Shostakovich to make a payday and to get back to better graces with the official music establishment that demanded "Socialist realism" portrayed in its music.



Both scores accompany movies depicting patriotic portraits of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin. "The Fall of Berlin" represents the Soviet victory over Germany in World War II and "The Unforgettable Year 1919" addresses the civil war in Petrograd in the years following the 1917 revolution. The films date from 1949 and 1951, respectively.



Even though they released this CD in 2000, Naxos labels the recordings the "premiere recording" of "Fall of Berlin" and the "first complete recording" of "The Unforgettable Year 1919". Both were edited by conductor-composer Adriano, a Swizter that goes by one name. He specializes in off the beaten track repertory and has the temperament to be effective in film music. I've heard previous recordings of his and none were as good as this one.



I'd say Adriano's edited version of "The Fall of Berlin" is the more effective of the two on this disk. It is full of major key flag-waving emotions, high minor key drama, and the excitement of battle and victory. Shostakovich's score eschews the glitter of American film music while still retaining the dynamic sweep necessary to create emotions and reflect the visual foundation.



The score has a notable main title and includes thematic material that will remind you of his wartime symphonies in the section titled "Alyosha and Natalia in the field -- Attack." A later section, "Storming Seelov Heights", is very exciting and the final 4-5 of 16 score elements build triumphant noise that concludes appropriatley.



The music for "The Unforgettable Year 1919" is not nearly at such an exalted level of inspiration. The main item, a 7-minute mini-piano concerto called "The Assault on the Red Hill", is Shostakovich making fun of the "Warsaw" concerto. The music is stupifying in its bombast and repitition and does little to mask the composer's cynicism he felt during this period.



While less inspired than "The Fall of Berlin", the 7-part score nonetheless nicely fills out a good sounding 75-minute CD that is well played by the Moscow Symphony Orchestra. Naxos' notes are helpful, as always, and do not include translations of the several sung sections. The DDD sound is very good and exceeds the label's standard.



I've not seen either film although I have witnessed a scene or two from "The Fall of Berlin", notably the penultimate "Stalin at the airport" scene. You can see it on "Shostakovich Against Stalin: The War Symphonies" (ASIN: B000BLBZM0), an outstanding 2006 documentary that details Shostakovich's war symphonies and Stalin's tyranny."