Shostakovich String Quartet No. 8 in C Minor (I)

its odd how he puts in different themes from other compositions throughout his life. like around 40 there is ma phrase from his first symphony. its lik his life story

this guy wrote some pretty kvlt music

the borodin play this very well, too, though, not having that recording with me, i cant say whether it is better (definitely the borodin + richter give the best sho piano quintet) -- the members of borodin knew sho personally and most of his string chamber music was written with them in mind, so no surprise they interpret brilliantly

This piece is supposed to be a memoire to the victims of Fascism, this is as sad as it gets, first of all Shostakovich's music was supressed by the dictator Stalin and then WWII broke out which really depressed everyone, in the third movement where the violins have their duet it represents the jew's screaming being carried off in the night by the gestapo, and then the fourth movement symbolized the gestapo knocking on the door.

You'd think the knocking would come before the whole getting carried off thing!

On topic, though, this is my favourite piece by Shostakovich. And it's by the Emerson String Quartet! I've got a CD of them performing 3 of Mozart's string quartets and they give a magnificent performance, as they do here. I'll have to track this one down :)

silentsteps, you've got a great playlist, good stuff

its definitely the emerson quartet. i have this recording at home

he was a genious. i just love how the first violin comes in at 2:03. brilliant recording, also. kudos to the emerson string quartet

probably in a world where war doesn't exist, and there are no problems. A perfect utopia.

speedy, the 8th Quartet was composed after Shostakovich visited Dresden, Germany, which had been absolutely destroyed in WW2. you can "hear" that bleak scene in this piece. what haunting music!