Symphony No. 15 (Shostakovich) - Use of Quotations

Use of Quotations

Ever the humourist, Shostakovich delighted in placing allusions to the works of himself and other composers in his work, and his Fifteenth symphony is particularly rich in quotations. In addition to the cryptic references to his own music, it includes an outburst of Rossini's William Tell Overture in the first movement (rehearsal figure 12); allusions to Mikhail Glinka and Gustav Mahler; and the use of Richard Wagner's Fate leitmotif from the Ring Cycle.

Most skillful is his manipulation of the famous grief leitmotif from Wagner's Tristan und Isolde at the end of the fourth movement. Beginning at rehearsal figure 113 in the first violin part, Wagner's famous motif of a rising minor sixth followed by a two note chromatic descent grows organically out of Shostakovich's own theme: a quirky and grotesque reference to the composer's own sense of suffering at his late stage of life, stated towards the close of this semi-autobiographical work.

The composer said in conversation with his friend, Isaak Glikman: "I don't myself quite know why the quotations are there, but I could not, could not, not include them". (Glikman p. 315).