This is not an anonymous or anodyne Fifth. The opening bars demonstrate Evgeni Svetlanov's tight control over his forces, even if the pronounced (almost jerky) articulation will not be to all tastes. The effect is arresting but rather too insistently positive—as if the symphony really were ''a Soviet artist's reply to just criticism''. In its self-confident thrust, the performance recalls the conductor's old Melodiya recording of the Tenth (HMV, 10/68—nla), one of a perplexingly small handful of contemporary Soviet works in his discography. Despite the change of name, his orchestra has changed astonishingly little since the 1960s; it remains at once superbly drilled and less tonally sophisticated than today's St Petersburg Philharmonic or the Russian National Orchestra. Svetlanov whips up considerable excitement in the first movement development, strings digging in and brass sounding off like buzz-saws (a touch of distortion in the recording, too, I thought), while the flute and horn duet, reprising second subject material, has a less gratifying period feel (12'50'' ff.). The movement as a whole seems more of a display piece than the desolate anti-Stalinist tract adumbrated by Kurt Sanderling. The different approach is particularly striking in the coda. Here Svetlanov's re-balancing of texture extends to some gerrymandering, after the Mahlerian glissando to fig. 46 (15'22'' ff.), which can scarcely be said to emphasize the inwardness of this music.
Having taken the second movement as a relatively weighty Landler, Svetlanov paces the Largo more urgently than is customary today. There is evidence of careful preparation and the music flows naturally enough, without plumbing the depths of Previn's 1965 recording (RCA, 5/66—nla). Svetlanov takes 13'50'' to Previn's 16'02'' and Sanderling's 15'32''. No doubt timings can be deceptive, and I was actually more disturbed by a finale, in which the element of vulgarity is given full rein. For its closing pages, Svetlanov adopts a slower tempo than the pre-Testimony Bernstein (taped in 1959), but the effect is more bombastic than ironic. In their different ways, the versions listed above bring a more personal sense of commitment to this extraordinary score. Although Svetlanov offers greater authenticity of timbre and considerable verve, it isn't quite enough. With the symphony's sense of emptiness and despair only fitfully apparent, the Japanese-sourced recording is not inappropriate—spacious and immediate, sometimes a bit crude in its spotlighting of detail (and not ideally crisp in the bass).
The coupling, not a specially generous one, has the Bolshoi Theatre orchestra's brass section reinforcing the State Symphony Orchestra to raucous effect. The Festive Overture's opening fanfare section is a shade too stodgy and grandiloquent for these Western ears. However, once the piece gets going, the performance really takes fire, the strings sounding richer than their counterparts in Ashkenazy's RPO. Incidentally, the (poorly translated) notes accord with Calum MacDonald's claim in the Decca booklet that the work was written in 1947 and shelved, whereas Elizabeth Wilson's fascinating new book on the composer, Shostakovich: A Life Remembered (Faber & Faber: 1994—see page 31) has it being dashed off at high speed a mere two days before the rehearsal in November 1954. This may not be Shostakovich at his best, but Svetlanov's players seem to be enjoying themselves and so will you. I would not want to exaggerate the lack of gravitas in the main work; it simply does not move me as it can.'