Dmitri Shostakovich, the Soviet composer, was one of the most prominent artists the USSR ever produced.
While his home town of Leningrad was under siege, Shostakovich was composing a symphony.
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Playlist:
Fanfare
Opening War Theme
Symphony No. 5 in E minor.
Composed in 1888 by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Public domain.
Public domain recording. Source.
Closing War Theme
Except when otherwise indicated, the contents of this podcast are © and ℗ 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025 by Mark Painter, all rights reserved. Some music and sound effects used by arrangement with Pond 5.
The transcript link points to Episode 405.
I listened to Episode 407, “The Siege of Leningrad II,” back in the Summer when it was released. I tried to comment on it at the time, but it doesn’t appear my attempt to post what I wrote was successful. Therefore, after a long pause, I am trying again. If I were successful back then, it might be that you are getting this input twice. My apologies.
At the end of the episode, you noted that Shostakovich’s Symphony Nr. 7, “Leningrad” was not met with enthusiasm by western critics, then asked for listeners to offer their thoughts. I first became familiar with it in the early 1970s as a Midshipman at the U. S. Naval Academy. While there, I took three years of Russian language (of which I hardly remember any words), and gained an interest in Russian and Soviet history and culture. I immediately liked the symphony, and still do. Admittedly, it simultaneously is a bit dramatic and derivative, but I judge it within the context in which it was composed. It also has occurred to me that western dismissal of the work could reflect envy that the west did not produce a World War II themed symphonic composition of similar stature.
While a Midshipman, I also encountered Shostakovich’s Symphony Nr. 13, the “Babi Yar.” Composed in 1962, Each of its five movements is a setting of one of then dissident Soviet poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko’s poems. The first movement, “Babi Yar,” from which the symphony gets its name, is, as expected, a protest against the Soviet Union’s cover up of the Nazi massacre of Jews at the Babi Yar ravine in Kiev. Listening carefully, you can pick out the names Anne Frank and Alfred Dreyfus, who are symbols of continuing antisemitism.
I realize you are well past the Babi Yar massacre in your timeline. I wanted to mention the symphony because, while Shostakovich’s Number 7 may not stand out as notable work, I consider his Number 13 to be the greatest composition of all genres in the past 80 years.