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Wigglesworth's Shosty Babi Yar half off at eclassical, but will the trees look sternly enough?




I've known the famous Kondrashin forever.

I don't expect the same searing, idiomatic intensity from Wigglesworth but I like what I've heard from the conductor so far and can recommend the 11th and 12th without hesitation. The 4th to a lesser extent.

Sound nuts will be thrilled: BIS does a great job capturing the Netherlands Radio Orchestra. The punch and weightiness of the sound is a marvel, and I'm assuming that the 13th will be just as overwhelming.

So, if you don't know the dreary story: Yevgeni Yevtushenko, the poet who wrote Babi Yar, was shocked and saddened to discover that there was no official memorial above a Ukrainian ravine into which mainly executed Jews were thrown by invading Nazis during WWII. In 1961 he published the brazen poem, which denounced anti semitism and the Soviet Govt's refusal to specifically acknowledge the ravine as a holocaust site

Unsurprisingly, Shostakovich's music for the 13th is painted in greys and black, including parts for solo bass and unison male choir. There are thrills and spills in the first movt, relatively-speaking, but the remaining movts can seem a bit static. Upon repeated listening, however, one will discover some truly touching moments. In my opinion, the key to making it through Shosty's more bare and psychologically- ruminating stretches is to think of the music as more ritualistic than argumentative. You just have to lose yourself in Shosty's simple, recurring ideas, which--to me--seem designed to suspend cognition.

I was going to give Petrenko on Naxos a try but given that the Wigglesworth is only $6 bucks today at eclassical, the young buck can wait.




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Topic - Wigglesworth's Shosty Babi Yar half off at eclassical, but will the trees look sternly enough? - jdaniel@jps.net 09:52:21 03/25/17 (82)
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