Shostakovich: Symphonies Nos. 1 & 3 / Vasily Petrenko

“This series… is developing into something really special. These RLPO Shostakovich recordings withstand comparisons with some of the greatest performances on disc.” Hugh Canning, The Sunday Times This is the fifth disc in Vasily Petrenko’s Shostakovich fantastic cycle, which is continuing to take critics by storm. Shostakovich’s First Symphony propelled the teenage composer to international prominence, its emotional range and innovative orchestration marking him as a daring and precocious talent on the scene. The Third Symphony, ‘The First of May’, originally intended as part of a symphonic cycle inspired by dates on the revolutionary calendar, has been described as ‘a reckless and at times chaotic accommodation between modernist intent and revolutionary fervour’.