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- Dmitri Shostakovich
Suite for Variety Orchestra No. 1 (1950)
- Dmitri Shostakovich Estate (USA, Canada and Mexico only)
This Suite has been recorded under many titles including Second Suite for Variety Orchestra, Jazz Suite No. 2, Second Jazz Suite.G Schirmer is the publisher of the work in the USA, Canada and Mexico only. Le Chant du Monde is the publisher of the work in France, Belgium, Luxemburg, Andorra, French speaking African countries.
- 2(pic).1.4.2asx+2tsx.1/3.3.3.1/timp.3perc/hp.pf.cel/str
- 25 min
- 28th March 2026, 51 Walden Performing Arts Center, Concord, MA, United States of America
- 29th March 2026, 51 Walden Performing Arts Center, Concord, MA, United States of America
Programme Note
Related Works:
Suite for Variety Orchestra No. 1
Waltz No. 2 for band
Waltz No. 2 for strings, piano(celeste), and percussion
This work basically represents a compilation of arrangements mainly from film and ballet music, and has frequently been misidentified as Shostakovich’s three movement ‘Suite for Jazz Orchestra No. 2’. The date of compilation of the ‘Suite for Variety Orchestra’ is not certain, but the utilization of ‘Waltz’, No. 8 from Op. 99a (Suite from ‘The First Echelon’) from 1956, as ‘Waltz II’ (No. 7) suggests that it was realized after 1956. ‘March’ (No. 1) is based on ‘March’, No. 2 from ‘Korzinkina’s Adventures’, Op. 59, ‘Dance I’ (No. 2) was adapted from ‘The MarketPlace’, No. 16 from ‘The Gadfly’, Op. 97. ‘Dance II’ (No. 3) goes back to ‘Invitation to a Rendezvous’, No. 20 from ‘The Limpid Stream’, Op. 39. While the origins of ‘Little Polka’ and ‘Finale’ (Nos. 4 and 8) are still uncertain, it seems to be clear that ‘Waltz I’ (No. 6) corresponds to ‘Lyric Waltz’, from ‘D. Shostakovich, Choreographic Miniatures’, a piano cycle published by Sovetsky Kompozitor Publishers in 1973. According to Manashir Yakubov the music of ‘Lyrical Waltz’ (No. 5) is found as ‘Sentimental Waltz’ in ‘D. Shostakovich, Simple Pieces, Excerpts from Compositions in Light Arrangement for the Piano’, compiled by Levon Atovmyan, Muzyka, 1967. The DSCH score notates the violins, originally divided into three groups matching the unusual distribution of a variety stage orchestra, as violin I and II. The parts of the two pianos can be performed on one piano four hands.
Moreover DSCH publishers announce for the thirty-fourth Volume of their New Collected Works the publication of ‘Waltzes’, a Suite for symphony orchestra in eight movements. This work is neither mentioned by Meyer nor Wilson, Fay or Hulme. According to the latter a ‘Suite for Variety Orchestra No. 2’ in four movements was discovered in 2000.
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1. March (Giocoso. Alla marcia)
2. Dance I (Presto)
3. Dance II (Allegretto scherzando)
4. Little Polka (Allegretto)
5. Lyrical Waltz (Allegretto)
6. Waltz I (Sostenuto)
7. Waltz II (Allegretto poco moderato)
8. Finale (Allegro moderato)
