A morsel of carrot on the tip of a conductor's baton

National Symphony Orchestra's performance of Shostakovich's Eleventh Symphony last Saturday was not bad. On the contrary, it was excellent. I cannot recall the orchestra sounding better, and the massed violas in the third movement, accompanied by nothing but a quiet pizzicato in the double basses, produced some of the finest sound from the notoriously ornery instrument I have heard anywhere. But it could have been much, much better. The credit for nearly ruining the performance goes to guest conductor Andrew Litton's introductory remarks.

Now, just making some remarks, while unnecessary, could be forgiven. And to be sure, Shostakovich can benefit from historical context more than most composers. The relevant information could easily be placed in the program notes, or the interested listener could look it up in any number of print or online sources, but ok, talk if you must. The coup de grâce was Litton's musical examples. He started with a few bars of the opening, as if to apologize for the movement's supposed stasis and to assure us that it really does make musical sense, but it got worse. One of the Eleventh's most famous features is Shosti's use of songs popular in Soviet Russia of his time, most of them rousing numbers intended to motivate workers and soldiers. While it's true that a typical American concert goer of today almost certainly does not know these songs, anyone with half an ear can tell where they are. Any pop, or folk (for that is what these songs had become), tune worth its salt sticks out immediately in the context of a large-scale symphony. But Litton insisted on having the orchestra play every single one, stripped of its context, bookended by explanations, to hammer us over the head with their prominence and illustrate the ideological ambiguity the composer introduced by syncopating, transposing, or otherwise changing the raw material of these songs, lest we forget that Shostakovich was a Very Complex Man working under Very Complex Political Circumstances. For one example, he went so far as to play over the PA a recorded sample of a version as it was performed in Russia by the Red Army Chorus before giving us the composer's rendition. What gives? Surely a conductor of Litton's caliber knows that a symphony only makes sense when played in its entirety, from beginning to end, in order? Imagine an accomplished chef carefully preparing a four-course meal, but before serving it to you, he hands you a fork with a piece of carrot on it and says, “This is one of the main ingredients in the salad.” Then, a spoonful of rice: “This is what the first course will be served with.” After that, a mouthful of freshly ground black pepper. As you choke on it, the chef says, “This is the principal seasoning I used in the main course.” Is that how you would like your meal introduced?

The experience was so bizarre that it provoked a reaction from the audience. After one particularly martial passage, complete with a staccato snare part, and Litton's comments about the brutality it supposedly portrayed, someone screamed “Got it!” A few moments later, a voice clearly yelled out, “Stop talking and play your music!” Rude to be sure. Some boos from the audience ensued. When Litton was finally done talking, he got some strong applause, no doubt as a sign of support and a desire to put the heckler in his place. At least I hope that was the reason. If, on the other hand, the patrons genuinely enjoyed having a bunch of unmoored musical morsels stuffed down their throats and washing them down with a lecture, then classical music is truly dead, not because the audience is getting old and dying, or because the tickets are too expensive, but because we are no longer capable of hearing a complete work on its own terms and forming a personal relationship with it without a crutch. Say it ain't so.