National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine- Shostakovich: Jazz Suites

An audiophile-grade LP transfer of a 2006 hit from the Brilliant Classics catalogue: stylish and exuberant accounts of some of Shostakovich's most popular orchestral music. Shostakovich's fluency in light music, and the sharp profile of his personality in an unexpected context, can still come as a shock. Yet he always sounded like himself, no less than Prokofiev or Stravinsky did, whether writing for string quartet or jazz band. And even in these suites of sly foxtrots and waltzes, a double-edged quality emerges, at once smoochy and sinister, depending as much on the mood of the listener as the intrinsic nature of the music. From 1934, the First Jazz Suite vividly brings a smoky Soviet jazz club to the mind's eye, with it's wailing solo trumpet and parody mandolin. At the same time, the distilled invention of the three brief movements sheds light on Shostakovich's early experience as a pianist accompanying silent films - capturing a scene or at atmosphere in sound almost at will. Th