SHOSTAKOVICH: SYMPHONIES NOS. 6 and 11. Concertgebouw...

SHOSTAKOVICH: SYMPHONIES NOS. 6 and 11. Concertgebouw Orchestra conducted by Bernard Haitink. London 411 939-1 (two records) (digital). Only one disc remains to complete Haitink’s Shostakovich symphony cycle, the first integral reading by non-Soviet forces of all 15 works and an outstanding addition to the catalogue. In this latest release, as elsewhere in the series, Haitink’s contribution has been marked by probity, intelligence, respect for the unbroken musical line and glowing execution by orchestras in Amsterdam and London. The compact Sixth Symphony (1939) needs no special pleading, and Haitink invests the introspective Mahlerian Largo with the requisite bleakness, summoning a measure of acid wit for the deceptively cheery finale. The conductor cannot obliterate the sprawling, programmatic bombast of the Eleventh (“The Year 1905”), yet he unerringly plays down the bald rhetoric of this 40th anniversary commemoration of the October Revolution, finding a rare poignancy where others uncover only bluster. The recording quality is spectacular.