Composers

Dimitri Shostakovich

Written by Dreamworldtech on Thursday 21 February 2008

One of the most appreciated Russian composers; Dimitri Shostakovich was born on September 25, 1906. His work had been rather controversial. In the earlier days of 1936 and 1948, he had to face two official condemnations for his music and his work was prohibited from general public, temporarily. However, later on he received a great amount of acknowledgement. These were the days when he received his state awards while living in Russia. Even though his works have been surrounded with controversy, he is remembered as a notable Russian composer of his times.

Shostakovich advocated modern music. Symphone No 2 and The Nose were his most eminent works. His work came to people when an era of Prokofiev and Stravinsky had passed. However, later on he developed a unique blend of styles, as in the case of Lady Macbeth and Fourth Symphony. With such a blend of styles Shostakovich brought forward a great amount of variations in his single piece of work, like the neo-classical style {having inspiration from Stravinsky} and a type of post-romantic style (influenced by Mahler). He had special ideas about tonality that included using modal scales and few of the neo-classical harmonies à la Hindemith and Prokofiev. Shostakovich’s music is marked with sharp contrasts along with touches of grotesque.

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