CD + Blu-Ray:
Kirill Petrenko and the Berliner Philharmoniker

Three works written amidst Stalinist censorship and the hope for freedom: Berliner Philharmoniker Recordings presents Shostakovich’s Symphonies 8–10.

Kirill Petrenko describes Dmitri Shostakovich’s Eighth Symphony as an “incredible psychological drama”. The composer wrote it while his life was in danger during the Second World War: between a perilous existence and Stalinist censorship. The Ninth and Tenth also bear vivid witness to Shostakovich’s confrontation with the regime – and his self-assertion.

Musically, each of the three symphonies is a world of its own: Shostakovich’s Eighth delivered a forced-smile tragedy to the authority greedy for patriotic hymns. With his Ninth Symphony, the composer then made a surprising u-turn, so that he had to remain silent as a symphonist until after Stalin’s death – in order to survive himself.

The Tenth burst out of Shostakovich – after an eight-year hiatus – immediately after Stalin’s death. Kirill Petrenko calls the work in which the composer makes himself the protagonist the “greatest liberation in his artistic work after the Fifth”. The hope for freedom that stands at the end of this symphony holds great topicality as a musical message.

The hardcover edition contains the recordings, made during the Corona pandemic, on two CDs and a Blu-ray. They are accompanied by an interview film with Kirill Petrenko and in-depth texts on Shostakovich’s works. The edition was designed by Thomas Demand: his photographs symbolise the tensions faced by Shostakovich in the creation of his works.