HRShostakovich_ The Cello Concertos

When Dmitri Shostakovich and cellist Mstislav Rostropovich got together, as they often did over the course of a remarkably productive collaborative friendship that lasted for nearly thirty years, they were rarely at a loss for words. As Shostakovich’s son Maxim has recalled, so freely did the conversation (often lubricated by vodka) flow between them that one day Shostakovich joked, “How about if we keep quiet for a while?” Shostakovich and Rostropovich first met in autumn 1943, when Rostropovich, then sixteen, enrolled in the Moscow Conservatory to study cello and composition. He also attended classes in orchestration taught by Shostakovich, who had only recently moved to Moscow from his native Leningrad. Their creative and personal relationship deepened when Rostropovich performed Shostakovich’s Cello Sonata op. 40, with the composer at the piano, at the Moscow Conservatory in 1954. But the crowning achievement of their collaborative friendship would be two cello concertos, as different as champagne and vodka.01 I. Allegretto02 II. Moderato03 III. Cadenza –04 IV. Finale. Allegro con moto05 I. Largo06 II. Scherzo. Allegretto –07 III. Finale. AllegrettoDigital Booklet.pdf13222990066/104.28.163.183