[methuselah]

The DSCH theme is strong in both. Symphony 10 predates SQ 8 by several years, yet, SQ8 is more ferocious. In which other works does the DSCH appear so prominently? I'm curious what others think. I'm also curious what, if any, parallels are to be found between his symphonies and string quartets. I'm somewhat surprised by how approachable his symphonies are - is this related to Soviet politics? Were the string quartets performed while he was living?

 

[dko22]

my take is that the quartets do represent a more private side of the composer than the symphonies which attracted more attention politically. I wouldn't really say that any of Shostakovich is unapproachable, though. Certainly the quartets were performed during his lifetime by the Beethoven, who premiered 13 of them, and Borodin Quartets in particular, though some western ensembles like the Fitzwilliam did them abroad.

I'll let others with better recall chip in with the specifics of which works use the DSCH motto -- they are fairly numerous though are not necessarily among his best for me (the 8th quartet, despite its popularity, needs a strong performance to be completely convincing in my view)