On March 5, 1942, the premiere of one of the most famous musical works of the 20th century, the 7th (“Leningrad”) symphony by Dmitry Shostakovich, took place in Kuibyshev (Samara):
“…What are the features of this work that make it intelligible and close to every Soviet listener, regardless of the degree of his musical preparedness? This is, above all, the utmost humanity and truthfulness of musical images. The symphony fully reflects all the feelings, thoughts and moods that the Soviet people live now, who in a unanimous impulse have risen to defend their Motherland, their culture, and from the greatest evil of humanity – from Hitler’s obscurantism, from the bloody medieval barbarism … ”
(“Volga Commune” (Kuibyshev), March 8, 1942)
On March 29, the symphony was performed for the first time in Moscow. In an article published in the newspaper Pravda, Shostakovich wrote:
“Today for the first time in Moscow, in the Hall of Columns of the House of Unions, by the forces of the joint orchestra of the Bolshoi Theater of the USSR and the All-Union Radio Committee under the direction of S.A. My 7th symphony will be performed by lynching. The performance of my symphony in Moscow was preceded by a lot of painstaking rehearsal work. The orchestra’s performers and conductor conducted it wonderfully. The author’s intention of this work is brilliantly carried out by these excellent masters…
I started working on the symphony at the end of July 1941. Finished at the end of December. The result was a large essay. Its duration is 1 hour 20 minutes. My symphony is inspired by the terrible events of 1941. The insidious and treacherous attack of German fascism on our homeland rallied all the forces of our people to repel the cruel enemy. The 7th symphony is a poem about our struggle, about our coming victory.
In connection with the events of 1941, life raised the question of the role of cultural workers in these days. The war we are waging against Hitlerism is the most just war. We defend the freedom, honor and independence of our homeland. We are fighting for the best human ideals in history. We are fighting for our culture, for science, for art, for everything that we created and built…”
(“Pravda”, March 29, 1942)
On June 22, 1942, the Leningrad Symphony premiered in London, on July 19 in New York, and on August 9 it was performed in besieged Leningrad:
“The glorious defenders of the city – soldiers and commanders of the Red Army, sailors, Red Banner Baltic soldiers, Stakhanovites of enterprises filled the hall. The seventh symphony, created in the city of Lenin during the siege, is especially close and understandable to Leningraders. That is why the audience warmly welcomed this outstanding piece of music. The Seventh Symphony sounded excellent, performed by the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of conductor K. Eliasberg.”
(“Komsomolskaya Pravda”, August 11, 1942)
“ВЧК ОГПУ”
