Shostakovich and Berg

The article is dedicated to the memory of one of the leading Russian researchers of Dmitri Shostakovich’s work, Tamara Nikolaevna Levaya. Turning to the genre of the “double portrait,” widely represented in her works, the author attempts to identify parallels and intersections in the creative destinies of two classics of the twentieth century — Dmitri Shostakovich and Alban Berg. First of all, biographical facts related to the Leningrad premiere of Wozzeck, which Shostakovich attended, are traced and clarified, and its influence is determined not only on Shostakovich’s operatic style, but also on the reception of both his operas. In addition, Berg’s interested attitude to Shostakovich’s First Symphony is documented. The most indicative ones are selected from a number of artistic and typological parallels: the phenomenon of processuality, which determined the involvement of both composers in energetics as an archetype of musical thinking in the 1920s, and a passion for Aesopian language and a hidden program, which finds expression in the use of musical monograms (their formation is traced on the basis of the signature). The chosen perspective allows us to clearly see not only similar aspects of creativity, but also to identify fundamental differences. Based on linear patterns, the development of thematic material in Berg maintains a connection with the principles of Schoenberg’s “musical prose.” His secret program is of a purely private nature, and the monograms do not have intonational specificity and are not designed for recognition. Shostakovich’s “thematically concentrated development” is associated with neo-baroque linearity. His Aesopian language was perceived by listeners as a “coded message to his contemporaries,” and the DSCH monogram became the intonational emblem of Shostakovich’s music. Keywords: Dmitri Shostakovich, Alban Berg, processuality, Fortspinnung, Aesopian language, monograms

Archetype · Expression (computer science) · Musical · Parallels · Passion · Perspective (graphical) · Phenomenon · Symphony · Central European and Russian historical studies · Emergency Medicine Education and Research · Musicology and Musical Analysis