Los Angeles Philharmonic: Petrenko Conducts Shostakovich November 25, 2012

Shostakovich began his Tenth Symphony shortly after Stalin died, and for many the work is a summary of the Stalin era. 'An optimistic tragedy' is how the Soviet Composer's Union finally described it, without suggesting any political portrait in it. 'Let them listen and guess,' was all the composer said at the time about any extra-musical meaning.