It's getting late here in Melbourne but it's still remarkably hot out, and a warm wind is blowing from the north-east, bringing humid air from the northern states down to our usually dry city. Often on warm evenings like this I find myself wanting to listen to Shostakovich, possibly because his music makes me think of the cold Russian winters he must have experienced, but also because I find something mysterious about these evenings which is matched by certain aspects of his music.
Above I have embedded the Borodin Quartet performing the 4th movement of his final, and 15th, Quartet. A mysterious work.
2 comments:
The 15th symphony also has a very curious, mystically-inclined Finale. Dmitri Shostakovich's string quartet cycle is the greatest and profoundest since Beethoven's and I hope his friendship with Benjamin Britten, a fellow 'outsider' in society, is noted well during the Britten centenary in 2013.
I've got to get the Beethoven Quartets... but I've been saying that for about three years now!
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