“Shostakovich in Context” is my first solo album – and at the same time the conclusion of a certain long journey. It is the last part of my artistic doctorate at the Sibelius Academy concentrating on the contextualisation of Dmitri Shostakovich’s music.
I have spent seven years working on my doctoral project. But my interest in the music of Shostakovich started much earlier – just as my interest in its potential connections to other music did. Even as a teenager – and especially in connection with Shostakovich’s music – I already noticed that a piece of music is not a closed entity, separate from the rest of the universe. A vital condition for its existence is its dialogue with other music and culture. An important part of this dialogue takes place in the mind of the audience, since everything we hear and perceive is reflected against the background of our previous experience.
This was the reason for choosing a programme in which six preludes and fugues by Shostakovich engage in dialogue with three large-scale piano works written in the 2000s: Toccata by Ilari Kaila and sonatas by Matei Gheorghiu and Mikko Nisula. I have the privilege of knowing all three composers personally, and I truly enjoy performing their music. The result is a very personal and unique symbiosis: my personal preferences in the field of contemporary music and my long affinity with the music of Shostakovich join together in the repertoire on this CD.
I have chosen the preludes and fugues that have something important in common with the contemporary works. The linearity of Shostakovich’s C major prelude and fugue has much in common with the Baroque echoes in Ilari Kaila’s Toccata. The F sharp minor prelude and fugue are firmly grounded in the folk music tradition – just like Matei Gheorghiu’s 2nd sonata. Mikko Nisula’s sonata was composed in the very middle of my doctoral project. I believe that my interest in Shostakovich’s music influenced Mikko’s sonata in some way – at least the last movement is a fugue. The world of the B flat minor prelude and fugue is very close to the mood of Mikko’s sonata, and the theme of the fugue, based on fourths, is almost a direct allusion to the theme of Shostakovich’s B flat major fugue.
The programme has a kind of overall “frame” – two Shostakovich preludes and fugues in a certain intertextual relationship with each other. The theme of the D minor fugue is introduced at the end of the E flat major prelude. But this motive is not Shostakovich’s own – it is a quotation from Gustav Mahler’s 1st symphony. This can be seen as a certain quintessence of dialogue and intertextuality principles: a work is not born in a void, but as a reaction to other works. At the same time its life continues – in other works and their performances. Therefore, I see “Shostakovich in context” primarily as my own contribution to the live dialogue with music.
Kirill Kozlovski
“Shostakovich in Context” is my first solo album – and at the same time the conclusion of a certain long journey. It is the last part of my artistic doctorate at the Sibelius Academy concentrating on the contextualisation of Dmitri Shostakovich’s music.
I have spent seven years working on my doctoral project. But my interest in the music of Shostakovich started much earlier – just as my interest in its potential connections to other music did. Even as a teenager – and especially in connection with Shostakovich’s music – I already noticed that a piece of music is not a closed entity, separate from the rest of the universe. A vital condition for its existence is its dialogue with other music and culture. An important part of this dialogue takes place in the mind of the audience, since everything we hear and perceive is reflected against the background of our previous experience.
This was the reason for choosing a programme in which six preludes and fugues by Shostakovich engage in dialogue with three large-scale piano works written in the 2000s: Toccata by Ilari Kaila and sonatas by Matei Gheorghiu and Mikko Nisula. I have the privilege of knowing all three composers personally, and I truly enjoy performing their music. The result is a very personal and unique symbiosis: my personal preferences in the field of contemporary music and my long affinity with the music of Shostakovich join together in the repertoire on this CD.
I have chosen the preludes and fugues that have something important in common with the contemporary works. The linearity of Shostakovich’s C major prelude and fugue has much in common with the Baroque echoes in Ilari Kaila’s Toccata. The F sharp minor prelude and fugue are firmly grounded in the folk music tradition – just like Matei Gheorghiu’s 2nd sonata. Mikko Nisula’s sonata was composed in the very middle of my doctoral project. I believe that my interest in Shostakovich’s music influenced Mikko’s sonata in some way – at least the last movement is a fugue. The world of the B flat minor prelude and fugue is very close to the mood of Mikko’s sonata, and the theme of the fugue, based on fourths, is almost a direct allusion to the theme of Shostakovich’s B flat major fugue.
The programme has a kind of overall “frame” – two Shostakovich preludes and fugues in a certain intertextual relationship with each other. The theme of the D minor fugue is introduced at the end of the E flat major prelude. But this motive is not Shostakovich’s own – it is a quotation from Gustav Mahler’s 1st symphony. This can be seen as a certain quintessence of dialogue and intertextuality principles: a work is not born in a void, but as a reaction to other works. At the same time its life continues – in other works and their performances. Therefore, I see “Shostakovich in context” primarily as my own contribution to the live dialogue with music.
Kirill Kozlovski
