Date of composition: 1953
Premiere: 17 December 1953 in Leningrad (today St. Petersburg) by the Leningrad Philharmonic, conductor: Yevgeny Mravinsky
Duration: 50 minutes
Performances by the Berliner Philharmoniker:
First performed on 1 March 1959 in the Academy of Arts, Berlin conducted by Herbert von Karajan
On 5 March 1953, Josef Stalin died – and the Soviet Union was plunged into profound mourning. Hundreds of thousands crowded the streets of Moscow to catch a glimpse of his embalmed body. Dmitri Shostakovich, however, experienced Stalin’s death as a tremendous liberation. For seventeen years, he had lived under harassment, bans, and reprimands, simply because his music displeased the dictator. He had even faced the real threat of arrest, deportation to a Gulag, or execution. Stalin’s end unleashed new creative energies in Shostakovich. For the first time in eight years, he took up a symphony again – his Tenth – which he completed over the summer of 1953. It became his personal reckoning with Stalinism.
The first movement opens with pitch-black sounds from the cellos and double basses, painting a portrait of Soviet society under Stalin: the people live in fear, oppressed and persecuted, with death ever-present. But after just under three minutes, a solitary voice rises – the solo clarinet – introducing the mournful second theme, as if recalling better, bygone times. Yet the melody cannot blossom, and the following dance-like idea is also abruptly halted, forced to start anew again and again. The fever pitch rises inexorably, culminating in violent outbursts from brass and percussion, almost physically painful. Is this resistance? Toward the end, the uprising collapses, and the music returns to the atmosphere of the opening.
A scherzo follows – but it is far from humorous. Here, Shostakovich depicts Stalin himself: a relentless chase, harsh blows, brutal accents, and racing sixteenth notes – a manic, merciless sonic world, evoking images of violence. Shostakovich himself commented on this movement with sarcasm: “I must say, it was hard work to depict the benefactor of humanity symphonically.” His main theme is a grotesquely accelerated version of Stalin’s favourite song, Suliko, set in a marching 2/4 rhythm.
But what comes after Stalin’s death? In the third movement, Shostakovich composes music reflecting the openness and uncertainty of the situation. He also inserts himself, using his musical monogram—the note sequence D–Es–C–H in German notation (Es = E-flat), corresponding to his initials: D for Dmitri, Es–C–H for Shostakovich. At first, his voice sounds hesitant, like a twitching puppet, as if he were still under the system’s control. And yet, he dares to assert his individuality again. Soon, a mysterious horn call appears, twelve times in total, as a warning: “Be vigilant and beware. For the devil, your adversary, may still be among you…”
When Shostakovich ventures toward a positive mood in the finale, after a restrained introduction, scepticism is warranted. The whirling dance seems almost too exuberant to be real. And indeed, the terrible motives from the Stalin scherzo suddenly infiltrate the cheerful revelry! In poisoned memory, in poisoned thoughts, Stalin lives on. And yet Shostakovich is strong enough to confront the tyrant. In the final moments of the symphony, he literally blasts out his monogram, overpowering both the festive atmosphere and the Stalinian drums. D–Es–C–H: “I, Dmitri Shostakovich, have survived you, Stalin!” His Tenth Symphony stands as a declaration against injustice and a testament to freedom, truth, and humanity.