jan 3, 1969 - 1969, Soviet Union.

Description:

The Symphony No. 14 (Op. 135) by Dmitri Shostakovich was completed in the spring of 1969, and was premiered later that year. It is a work for soprano, bass and a small string orchestra with percussion, consisting of eleven linked settings of poems by four authors. Most of the poems deal with the theme of death, particularly that of unjust or early death. They were set in Russian, although two other versions of the work exist with the texts all back-translated from Russian either into their original languages or into German.
Shostakovich attached great importance to this work, commenting in a letter to Glikman: "Everything that I have written until now over these long years has been a preparation for this work." He added that he intended the symphony to prove a counterweight to the positive presentation of death in music.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMZ8d8J7cbM