ABSTRACT
The Seventh Symphony possesses the glamour of drama. Even though only the opus number appears on the title page of the original manuscript, Shostakovitch has himself connected the symphony with the heroic resistance of Leningrad during the siege, and so the Symphony has acquired the sobriquet “Leningrads.” Now here comes a new symphony, the Eighth, which has no such dramatic program. Yet the interest for this new work is as great as for the Seventh. There are eager bids for the right of first performance in the United States, and cables are sent from Moscow with tantalizing descriptions of the imposing dish to be served shortly to musical audiences here. And imposing it certainly is, for it takes over an hour to play: Shostakovitch is uncompromising in his symphonic expansiveness.
