ABSTRACT
This chapter examines musical correlations of semantic modes of ambiguity and therefore, to a certain extent, also deals with the comic in music. Most studies of Dmitri Shostakovich consist of biographical material. The domain of Shostakovich research was so loaded with political and ideological considerations that even works which sincerely aspired to be purely analytical could not entirely avoid ideological preconceptions. Apart from the considerable role that modes of ambiguity play in Russian culture in general, and in modern Russian theories of literature and art in particular, it seems that ambiguities also carried a personal significance for Shostakovich himself. Themes of irony, parody, satire and the grotesque are constantly intercalated in Shostakovich's biographies as well as in his musical works, speeches and articles. In certain special lullabies, however, the 'march' topos is indeed enhanced by the use of certain musical gestures, enriching and complicating the final cultural unit.
