Courage?

Caught up in the turmoil of totalitarian political censorship, the three Russian composers featured in this programme share the ability to draw from their musical language and inspirations the force and courage to resist. 

With the delicate Fairy Tale Poem, Sofia Gubaidulina, who passed away last March, composed one of her most emblematic and spiritual works. This fable tells the story of a small piece of chalk, a tyrannical object on the blackboard but also an instrument for drawing and imagination; a children's story that precedes excerpts from Prokofiev's ballet Cinderella, based on Charles Perrault's fairy tale. 

Composed in the extremely difficult context of war, the work recounts the story of a little heroine who is the victim of her sisters' cruelty and jealousy, overcoming trials and tribulations to find love. 

Forced by Stalin to compose a work glorifying the USSR, Shostakovich turned his Fifth Symphony into an ‘artist's response’, both a sublime snub and a powerful masterpiece whose finale stirs emotions to their highest degree.