Principles of Musical Allegories in D. D. Shostakovich’s Creative Work: Speculation in Sound VS Musical Intertext

Abstract

The aim of this research is to define the principles of political and philosophical musical allegories in the creative work of D. D. Shostakovich. In this article the assessment of the composer’s symphonic works has been given. The extent of the philosophical issues of D. D. Shostakovich’s symphonic works has been characterized. The composer’s forms of politization of his creative work have been identified. The scientific novelty of this research consists in the characteristic of D. D. Shostakovich’s creative method being new for that time. This method was based on using collage made of the citations and pseudo-quotation notes of Shostakovich’s and other composers’ works. The citations and pseudo-quotation notes played the roles of non-music subtext and hidden allegory which had the philosophical conception of the artistic whole for creating the deep structure of his own works. As a result, it is concluded that D. D. Shostakovich’s works including his symphonies reconstruct the chronicle of the current events of the soviet and Russian history of the XX century and have a unique historical content. These works comprise the composers’ ideas and philosophical interpretation of that historical period.