Shostakovich in America

Synopsis

It’s all a matter of timing. In 1942, the Soviet Union was America’s wartime ally, and the Soviet composer Dmitri Shostakovich made the cover of TIME magazine. Seven years later, the war was over, but the Cold War was on — with a vengeance.

On March 25, 1949, Shostakovich arrived in New York for his first visit to America as part of the Soviet delegation to a Cultural and Scientific Congress for World Peace.

By then the anti-Communist tide of American public opinion resulted in pickets and protests.  Those who spoke at the congress, including the American composer Aaron Copland, felt compelled to preface their comments with unambiguously anti-Communist manifestos. Shostakovich nervously read the equally unambiguous speech prepared for him by his Soviet minders, attacking American imperialism in general and expatriate Russian composer, Igor Stravinsky, in particular. It was embarrassing for everyone concerned.

But while he was in New York, Shostakovich got to play a piano reduction of the Scherzo from his Symphony No. 5 for a huge crowd at Madison Square Garden. That, at least, resulted in a big ovation — and maybe that was how he privately approached the whole, sad affair — as a kind of grim scherzo, or joke.

Music Played in Today's Program

Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975): Symphony No. 5; USSR Cultural Ministry Symphony; Gennady Rozhdestvensky, conductor; MCA 32128

On This Day

Births

• 1699 - German opera composer Johann Hasse, in Bergedorf, near Hamburg

• 1867 - Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini, in Parma

• 1881 - Hungarian composer Béla Bartók, in Nagyszentmiklós

• 1882 - English composer Haydn Wood, in Slaithwaite

Deaths

• 1918 - French composer Claude Debussy, 55, in Paris

Premieres

• 1724 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 182 (Himmelskönig, sei Willkommen) performed on the Feast of the Annunciation as part of Bach's first annual Sacred Cantata cycle in Leipzig (1723/24)

• 1725 - Bach: Sacred Cantata No. 1 (Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern) performed on the Feast of the Annunciation as part of Bach's second annual Sacred Cantata cycle in Leipzig (1724/25)

• 1734 - Handel: anthem This is the day which the Lord hath made (Julian date: March 14)

• 1874 - Brahms: 13 Variations on a Hungarian Song for piano, in London

• 1875 - Gilbert & Sullivan: one-act operetta Trial by Jury at the Royalty Theatre in London

• 1879 - Dvorak: Symphony No. 5, in Prague

• 1881 - Dvorák: Symphony No. 6, with Prague Philharmonic, Adolf Cech conducting

• 1939 - Villa-Lobos: Bachianas Brasilieras No. 5 for soprano and eight cellos, in Rio de Janeiro

• 1943 - Edward Joseph Collins: Piano Concerto No. 3, by the Chicago Symphony with Frederick Stock conducting and the composer as soloist

• 1946 - Stravinsky: Ebony Concerto at Carnegie Hall, with the Woody Herman orchestra conducted by Walter Hendl

• 1960 - Elliott Carter: String Quartet No. 2, in New York City, by the Juilliard String Quartet

• 1965 - Jack Beeson: opera Lizzie Borden, in New York City

Others

• 1938 - American premiere of Prokofiev: Peter and the Wolf, by the Boston Symphony, conducted by the composer

• 1949 - Shostakovich (accompanied by KGB handlers) arrives in New York for his first visit to America, for the Cultural and Scientific Conference for World Peace, held at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. His anti-Western statements and criticism of Igor Stravinsky embarrassed his American sponsors, including Aaron Copland, and later provided political fodder for the notorious Red-hunter, Senator Joseph McCarthy.