Lenox — Fortunately for all music lovers who value their artistic liberty, the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s performance of Shostakovich’s fourth symphony at Tanglewood on Friday, Aug. 17, will come at little risk to anyone’s life, limb or property. In totalitarian states, however, it’s only a matter of time before someone gets imprisoned, tortured or killed because of an officially unacceptable piece of music or other work of art. Dmitri Shostakovich knew this as well as anyone when he composed — and even rehearsed — his fourth symphony, only to withdraw it under the threat of death at the hands of disapprover-in-chief Joseph Stalin and his merry lieutenants. Originally scheduled to receive its premiere performance in December 1936, Shostakovich’s fourth symphony was finally performed for the first time 25 years later, in December 1961, eight years after Stalin’s death.
There is no consensus among Shostakovich scholars about why, exactly, the composer suppressed his fourth symphony or whether he would have been executed or merely imprisoned and tortured if he hadn’t. There is endless speculation, too, about Shostakovich’s musical intentions in this and practically everything else he wrote. In fact, debating these questions seems to have become something of an industry in the academic world.
Orchestras specializing in the music of Dmitri Shostakovich are uncommon, but rare is the ensemble that performs it at the level of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Two Grammy Awards attest to the BSO’s stature as a leading interpreter of the Russian composer’s music, but in the concert hall, your own ears will attest to it even if you’ve never heard a note of Shostakovich before. The players demonstrated this in dramatic fashion when they performed Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5 on July 8.
The extreme technical and emotional demands placed on performers of Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 4 have a way of separating the men and women from the boys and girls. Among professional orchestral musicians, Shostakovich’s fourth symphony is widely considered his most difficult. That’s one reason it is rarely performed or recorded. Another is that it requires unusually large forces — over 100 musicians — all of which must have unusual skill and stamina to get through the hour-long piece. This symphony’s breadth of expression, says BSO music director Andris Nelsons, demands that, “no emotion be spared, that nothing be left in reserve in performance.” That’s asking a lot of any ensemble, but this is where the musicians of the Boston Symphony Orchestra shine most brightly.
As if Shostakovich’s fourth symphony weren’t enough for one evening, the first half of Friday’s program features Yefim Bronfman joining the BSO for Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4. Bronfman is the real deal, a superstarheadliner, and he never fails to impress or please.
