Search - Shostakovich, Cluytens :: Symphony 11

No1 recommendation for this work.

R. Ball | London W14, England United Kingdom | 02/19/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"If you had to have only one version of Shostakovich 11 it would have to be this. All round the performance has the best balance of vitality, freshness, power and urgency of any and is more vividly recorded than almost any subsequent version. The only serious contenders are Stokowski and Mravinsky but the Moscow Stokowski version is overdriven to the point of hysteria and sounds like it was recorded over the telephone whereas the Houston Stokowski is superb in the slow movements but needs a bit more pungency in the dramatic sections. On the other hand Mravinsky is excoriating at almost every opportunity but tends to leave no breathing space and rather skates over the surface of the adagios. The Cluytens is the ideal combination of dramatic bite and sustained tension and had the benefit of collaborative advice from the composer, who was present throughout the recording sessions."