Two of the 20th century’s most eloquent musical responses to war are paired here: Shostakovich’s Chamber Symphony – AKA his String Quartet No 8 as arranged for string orchestra by Rudolf Barshai – and Strauss’s Metamorphosen for 23 solo strings. The orchestra, made up of front-rank players from the St Petersburg Philharmonic, is immediately convincing in the Shostakovich, with a lonely, otherworldly violin solo to set the scene at the very beginning, and plenty of bite later on under Emmanuel Leducq-Barôme’s driven conducting. Shostakovich vividly portrays war’s devastating impact on a personal level; Strauss, with the burnt-out ruin of the Dresden Opera House in his mind’s eye, was grieving for a whole culture. The players sound a notch less securely blended in his work but the performance glows once it gets going and ultimately achieves a compelling intensity, especially when its theme piles up upon itself towards the end.
