Shostakovich: Piano Concertos 1 & 2; String Quartet No 8 CD review – an ingenious disc

Always under the shadow of a regime he had to support but privately feared, Shostakovich in Russia took refuge both in tortured private music and ironic public music. The two come together in this ingenious disc, which couples the two extrovert piano concertos with new transcriptions for solo piano of string quartets, including the whole of the Eighth Quartet. This introverted, depressive meditation perhaps transfers less well than the eerie Waltz from the String Quartet No 2. Pianist and arranger Boris Giltburg gives sharp-edged accounts of the two concertos: the strident First more successful than the jokey Second. Excellent support from trumpeter Rhys Owens and the Liverpool Philharmonic.