Shostakovich and Mussorgsky - by Robert Kirzinger and Marc Mandel, narrated by Eleanor McGourty

Summary: Listen to the concert preview. The first Casual Friday of 2016-17 pairs Dmitri Shostakovich's brief but exciting Festive Overture, written in 1954 to mark the 37th anniversary of the Soviet Revolution, with French composer Maurice Ravel's orchestration of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. Originally for solo piano, this familiar but always scintillating orchestral tour-de-force provides a musical depiction of an imagined stroll through a gallery of paintings and drawings, ranging from a fantastic gnome and a buoyant ballet of chicks in their shells to the dark shadows of subterranean catacombs and the majestic splendor of the Great Gate of Kiev.