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Shostakovich...WHOA


An old g/f made a copy of a Shostakovich recording and until this week I’d never gotten around to it. MAN, is this guy giving me nightmares. I don’t know a damn thing about classical music but HOLY CHRISTMAS!

I can’t call up the old g/f to ask (I want to live, I want to live!) so I’m hoping someone can ID this recording and then offer suggestions to similar Shostakovich. I’m looking for brooding, scary, intense, hair-raising chaos…just like what’s-her-name.

The recording I was given has the following handwritten on it: “Kammersinfornie (after) string Quartet #8 & #10.” “1960” is also written on the recording with an arrow from it pointing to “Quartet #8.” The track most indicative of what I like is #2 whatever that is.

What’s this guy’s rep in the classical world, anyway? Maybe the style of this recording isn’t representative of his work.

As an interesting side note…this girl was always giving me really twisted material as witnessed by the title of the last book she gave me: “The Insanity of Normality – Realism as Sickness: Toward Understanding Human Destructiveness.” An army of red flags popped up with that one but I valiantly forged ahead with my little pea shooter anyway (please excuse the disgusting and humiliating metaphor.) I got clobbered.
kublakhan

Showing 2 responses by jax2

jax2
3,031 posts
 
I'd second the Borodin Quartet. I have a recording on BBC Music (one of the BBC Legends series) that includes two other great string quartet's, one by Borodin (String quartet No. 2) and the other by Ravel (String Quartet in F). They are from live performances at the Leigh Town Hall for the Edinburgh Festival in 1962. The recording was remastered in 20-bit and is an original (analog) mono recording. The recording is OK, the performances are GREAT. The other two on this disc are much lighter in comparison to the Shostakovich, but then again, I'd say most are!

Marco
jax2
3,031 posts
 
The Emmerson Quartet that Shubertmaniac mentioned is also available as a single disk with only the 8th String Quartet played without pause. I believe it is the same version on the boxed set and is also on Deutsche Grammaphon. It is much cheaper than the boxed set if you are only after that one piece. I only mention it as it was the seed that started the whole thread. Here is the Amazon Listing
I have not heard it so cannot comment on the performance or quality of the recording.
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