surely one of the greatest Russian composers since Tchaikovsky
The irony being, of course, that Dmitry Dmitrievich lived to write 15 symphonies and 15 string quartets, after the naughty old USSR treated him free of charge. He was, it's true, pressured by another composer (Khrennikov) to withdraw and denounce LADY MACBETH OF MTSENSK, and certain other works [astonishingly even the Socialist Realist comedy THE BRIGHT STREAM (SVETLIE RUCHEI)]. And he was chucked out of the Composer's Union, and wasn't allowed the Composer's Villa on the Black Sea. He died of old age.
Meanwhile Pyotr Ilyich was abducted in broad daylight by Tsarist ultra-conservative loonies, who put him on trial in a kangaroo court made up of extremist Freemasons - and then locked in a room with a loaded pistol. He had, it's true, been pressured by another composer (Balakirev) to withdraw his opera THE SECRET AGENT (OPRICHNIK) despite its whirlwind success - he then denounced the work in a newspaper article, and even asked the Jurgenson printing house to destroy the plates. Allegedly it was an 'anti-Russian' opera? Exactly what would later be said about LADY MACBETH.
But the difference was that Tchaikovsky was done in by lovely capitalist Imperialist nutters, whereas Shostakovich was banned from the composer's villa by saucy Stalinists ;)
???
