Join the Kentucky Symphony Orchestra for a recollection of tribulation and perseverance via symphonic music.
The January 25 concert at NKU’s Greaves Concert Hall opens (not with the Beatles but) with Sergei Prokofiev’s Overture to his opera based on Tolstoy’s War and Peace, followed by Shostakovich’s 7th Symphony, a tribute to his native town and citizens.
Composer Dmitri Shostakovich was born, grew up, and worked in Leningrad (St. Petersburg). When the Nazis set their sites on the U.S.S.R., Shostakovich began his 7th Symphony. As the Nazis encircled the city in late Summer of 1941, the Soviet government ordered its star composer to evacuate with his family. He begrudgingly did so (with two movements complete) and finished his large scale work in Kuybyshev (Samara), where it was premiered by the Bolshoi Theater Orchestra (evacuated from Moscow) on March 5, 1942.
Orchestras in the U.S. and the West clamored to be among the first to perform Shostakovich’s “Leningrad” Symphony. Microfilm of the score traversed oceans and several continents amidst government intrigue. The Symphony had performances in London (June) and New York (July), but its most moving was held in Leningrad on August 9, 1942. (The date Hitler predicted he would hold a victory party in the city’s Astoria Hotel).
To create a diversion the Soviet defenders began an artillery assault on several Nazi positions just before the concert to draw attention away from the lit theater across town. Three of the rag-tag group of radio orchestra members and military band musicians, assembled for the Leningrad performance, died of starvation during the 40-rehearsal schedule.
As the historic concert was broadcast throughout the city on loudspeakers, Shostakovich’s epic 7th Symphony fostered a sustaining hope within the musicians and audience in the hall, and those citizens and soldiers listening, instilling a will to persevere until the Nazis were driven back in January of 1944.
The Kentucky Symphony Orchestra recalls this amazing work’s story in “Back in the U.S.S.R.” Those attending will hear (in addition to the up-sized orchestra — 9 horns, 6 trumpets, 6 trombones), the distant sounds of bombardment prior to the concert to help imagine the conditions into which this symphony was born.
Get tickets here. They are $19 – $35 (50% off Children 6 – 18 , and student rush tickets $20). Livestream pass $35, with unlimited virtual access for 60 days after the concert.
For additional info and tickets — visit kyso.org or call (859) 431- 6216.