A Story That Has To Be Told

It is not so often now that I have any new addition to what might be called core repertoire but this disk fills in one of the remaining gaps in my collection of Shostakovich symphonies. This is Symphony No 13 "Babi Yar" by the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and Choir conducted by Mark Wigglesworth with the bass soloist Jan-Hendrik Rootering. As with almost all Shostakovich symphonies, there is a political subtext. This was a late work with the composer pushing the boundaries of what might be acceptable to the Soviet authorities post Stalin by setting texts referring to the massacre of Ukrainian Jews in WW2 at Babi Yar. Some distillation was ordered at the time but this is the original setting with any later sops to the sensibilities of the Soviets removed. Pushing the boundaries of what might be considered a symphony as opposed to an orchestral song cycle, subsequent movements set texts concerning other satirical but less contentious sides of Soviet life, such as the strength of the working women and the office politics required to sustain a career. It could be looked upon as an unremittingly bleak work but I feel that there are also segments which show hope in the resilience of the human spirit and the performances here are excellent in good recorded sound. Which makes it all the more regrettable that the continued existence of this orchestra is in grave doubt thanks to ideological cuts imposed on the arts by the new coalition Dutch government.