Shostakovich

has been composer of the week on R3. There have been a couple of pieces that have stood out for me:

2 of the 24 Preludes and Fugues and the Viola Sonata

Good stuff.

 

The Viola Sonata - his final published work - is one of the pieces of music that strikes a massive resonance with me..... I strongly recommend the recording by Tabea Zimmerman and Hartmut Holl on EMI, if its still available. Its coupled with the almost-as-good Lachrymae (John Dowland variations) by Benjamin Britten.

 

I like the Viola Sonata fine - DSCH's very last work as I recall, super-bleak - but I can imagine a couple other works that are a trifle richer, and yet partake of this late-phase esthetic, such as the string quartets 12 through 15, the second piano sonata, symphony nr 14 and 15.

 

I find the 15th quartet even more bleak than the viola sonata!

 

Try the Piano Quintet and 2nd PianoTrio - IMO, for what its worth, his chamber masterworks.

 

I like these very much. My wife's favourite is symphony nr. 13 (Babi Yar).

 

I still listen regularly to my LP of Previn and the LSO arduously handling his Eighth Symphony. I've had it since I was a teenager and it still moves and excites me.
I've performed his 4th, 8th and 10th string quartets, his viola sonata and piano quintet (with Richard Roberts, concertmaster of the Montreal Symphony and Terry Tam, concertmaster of the Victoria Symphony), symphonies nos 1, 5, 9, and 10, and various other works. I always imagine him lying at night, unable to sleep, with his emergency bag containing toothbrush and clean underwear, under his bed.
After Stravinsky and Bartok, Prokofiev and Shostakovich are the composers who speak to me the most.