Shostakovich: New Babylon [complete score]

"[The New Babylon] was the last gasp of this anything-goes era, and boasted a blistering score by the 22-year-old Shostakovich. So blistering, in fact, that nobody could perform it, and it was "lost" for decades...it is sardonic, brittle and laden with saucy Offenbach quotes. But two discs' worth of dazzling freneticism is too much."
(The Times)

"Whilst the music is perfect as a way of describing the film's story I still feel that it is a wonderfully atmospheric work in its own right away from the screen..it shows how incredibly mature and developed Shostakovich's music was even as early in his career as this. I am sure he was as satisfied with his music years later as he was at the time of writing it. It is a great addition to any collector of his music and is superbly played on this disc."
(Bargain of the Month MusicWeb Dec 2011)

This recording of New Babylon, one of Shostakovich's most inventive and truly symphonic film scores, is the first complete recording of all the surviving music from the original 'lost' manuscript full score and the first to use five solo string players only, as conceived by the composer. A remarkable collage of marches, can-cans, carnival music, tumultuous rhythms and musical quotations, New Babylon bristles with witty dissonance and brassy ebullience, emphasising the film's content rather than its visual surface. Mark Fitz-Gerald's two previous Naxos world première recordings of Shostakovich's film scores for Alone (8570316) and The Girlfriends (8572138) have been highly acclaimed.