Shostakovich Symphony No.7
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Dmitri Shostakovich
Label: Chandos
Magazine Review Date: 8/1988
Media Format: Vinyl
Media Runtime: 0
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: ABRD1312

Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Symphony No. 7, 'Leningrad' |
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer Neeme Järvi, Conductor Royal Scottish National Orchestra |
Composer or Director: Dmitri Shostakovich
Label: Olympia
Magazine Review Date: 8/1988
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 75
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: OCD118

Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Symphony No. 7, 'Leningrad' |
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer Gennady Rozhdestvensky, Conductor USSR Ministry of Culture State Symphony Orchestra |
Composer or Director: Dmitri Shostakovich
Label: Chandos
Magazine Review Date: 8/1988
Media Format: Cassette
Media Runtime: 0
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: ABTD1312

Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Symphony No. 7, 'Leningrad' |
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer Neeme Järvi, Conductor Royal Scottish National Orchestra |
Composer or Director: Dmitri Shostakovich
Label: Chandos
Magazine Review Date: 8/1988
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 69
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: CHAN8623

Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Symphony No. 7, 'Leningrad' |
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer
Dmitri Shostakovich, Composer Neeme Järvi, Conductor Royal Scottish National Orchestra |
Author: Stephen Johnson
All the same, these performances are quite different. Tautness and needle-sharp clarity characterize much of the Rozhdestvensky, while Jarvi is more given to expressive generosity, whether in impassioned outpourings or moments of tenderness (how touching that piccolo solo in the first movement second group can sound!). Jarvi's enthusiasm in the opening allegretto is compelling, but he hurries certain details beyond the point where they can speak clearly. Rozhdestvensky has both clarity and drive here—but he doesn't quite find the warmth Jarvi releases in the music that follows.
Looking over the remainder of the work, I find Jarvi more telling in the scherzo (lovely bass clarinet and low flutes in the recap) and Rozhdestvensky more stirring in the third movement, the sharp edges he brings to the opening wind chorale and violin recitatives heighten the intensity and emphasize the consolatory role of the long flute theme that follows. Again, in the finale, honours are fairly evenly distributed: the early stages are unusually exciting under Jarvi the closing pages gritty and determined in Rozhlestvensky's hands. Incidentally, there's a slight technical problem with the Rozhdestvensky disc at the beginning of the finale: on my copy, track four begins at fig. 150—the finale actually begins at fig. 147, 66 bars earlier. As regards recorded sound, Jarvi has the advantage; the Rozhdestvensky sounds slightly constricted and hard after the warm spaciousness of the Chandos issue, but the ear soon adjusts.
In the end I think it's the Rozhdestvensky I'd go for, simply because his version presents a more consistently compelling sense of narrative, but the Jarvi is a strong competitor—it's certainly deeply felt, as would befit a memorial tribute to the great Evgeny Mravinsky; though why he chose for that purpose a Shostakovich symphony that Mravinsky
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