In this stimulating and in some ways disquieting programme, each work stems from very personal ground-springs and shares one sombre musical climate. Shostakovich's Eighth Quartet symbolizes a multi-layered tragedy in that its elegiac tone reflects, in addition to compassion for the persecuted (here the victims of both Fascism and Stalinism), the composer's forced Party membership. "If I die sometime or other," wrote Shostakovich to the musicologist Isaak Glikman in a mood of despairing self-deprecation, "it's pretty unlikely that someone will write a work in my memory. So I decided to write such a piece myself."

The original has long been hailed a masterpiece: its structural ingenuity, vivid sense of narrative, brilliant writing for strings and copious self-quotation (most of it easily recognizable) leave an indelible impression and Rudolf Barshai's orchestration is effective in that the quotations sound even more startling. Furthermore, the extra weight of tone he lends to, say, the Allegro molto second movement, allied to Dennis Russell Davies's generally broad tempos, brings it into line with the devastating (and chronologically much earlier) Eighth Symphony.

One wonders whether either Vasks or Schnittke would have developed in the way they did without Shostakovich's inspired example. Schnittke's fattened Trio is cast in two quarter-hour movements and although not polystylistic in any obvious sense, pits traditional cadences against some decidedly modern harmonic and rhythmic ideas. Ives occasionally comes to mind (6'52" into the first movement), so - rather unexpectedly, perhaps - does Philip Glass (5'16"), whereas the second movement recalls the world of Bartok's Divertimento, and the little folk-tune played on high harmonics at 4'03" sounds like a distant reveille. It is an uneasy work, questioning though consolatory, and the high, wavering line that brings it to its close intensifies the sense of mystery. Vasks's Musica dolorosa is a near-relation of both Shostakovich and Kancheli, sometimes nostalgic (shades of Piazzolla - probably coincidental - fall near the beginning of the piece), sometimes grimly purposeful (the marching motive that starts around 3'54"). All three performances are extremely fine, as is the recording, and Gerard McBurney's superb annotations greatly aid one's appreciation.

Rob Cowan
Gramophone, September 1997

Just how superior the Stuttgart players are may be gathered from the second movement of Shostakovich’s Chamber Symphony, in which they display a grasp of rhythm, articulation, ensemble and tuning hard to fault. Russell Davies, who really feels his modern Eastern Europeans, contrasts this lament for Dresden and humanity with Yuri Bashmet’s sensitive arrangement of Schnittke’s elegiac String Trio. He introduces us to a powerfully moving piece by Latvian Peteris Vasks (b1946) – Musica dolorosa. It’s a pre-glasnost work whose tonal dramas, sliding perspectives and ‘stripped-down musical syntax, with echoes of Romantic and Baroque music and even of early church music’ (McBurney), linger long in the mind. Benefiting from charismatically brilliant playing, poetic phrasing, spectacular sound and spiritually involving bass resonances, this is an anthology not to be missed.

The New Albion release usefully brings together Rudolf Barshai’s inimitable transcriptions of the Eighth and Tenth Quartets – the one autobiographical, ‘to the memory of the victims of fascism and war’; the other proposing that ‘evil, although it cannot be ignored, is no match for deeper human emotions’ (Alan George). Like the ECM album, the recording is clean and spacious. But the orchestral standard falls short of the German optimum. The Chamber Symphony in particular, a breathless scrap, suffers from speeds that tend to weaken rather than confirm its gravitas.

Ates Orga
BBC Music Magazine