I'd just like to record my appreciation for the little interchange regarding the photograph of Steinberg between Messrs Torheit and Grew, members who have not exactly always seen eye to eye: thank you, Reiner, for your prompt action in locating the picture, and thank you equally, Mr Grew, for your courteous acknowledgement. A leap for the membership (whether great or giant) indeed.

What could be a better fragment of an answer to the original question than this clip, which Pim found for the"'watch and listen" thread: here is Shostakovich, in the 1930s, playing the end of his first Piano Concerto....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYOpnq6h_Ms 

That's a commanding presence, and a fantastically clear beat, IGI: everything's been meticulously rehearsed: there's no need for frantic signposting. I'm going to have to check now, but I think that that's significantly slower than I've heard him take that peroration before.

btw, Did you catch that MDT Maxim Supraphon complete set special offer price? £20 for a limited period only. I have more or less called a halt to the expanding Shostakovich collection, but that was one set which was still on the list, so it's on its way....

So far, only Vol. 2 has made it to the Dough shelves, where, truth to be told, it is still sitting in its cellophane wrapping: but the others are 'on the list'.....

According to an old programme note I've got, that 'Jingle Bells', and the rest of the King Lear music in Op 58a, was indeed for a stage production directed by Grigori Kozintsev at the Bolshoi Drama Theatre in St Petersburg in 1941  - it says here.

I'd probably agree from what I've heard of the Jansons - spreading the cycle over 18 years with eight different orchestras cannot really lend much of an integrated approach. With Maxim conducting the Prague SO throughout, I think this could well be a cycle to add to my shelves, especially at £2 a disc.

Looks as if the Supraphon complete cycle under Maxim at the special price of £20 is back in stock at MDT: I've had an email advising me that mine's been despatched.

Oh IGI, that's another itchy credit-card moment, then....

Meanwhile, the Maxim box has arrived, and I've started with No.2. Ollie will be thrilled to learn that MSCH goes the whole hog and employs a siren of the wind-up variety, which gives rise to some interesting clashes of pitch as its wail rises and falls. It's another cracker of a performance of this Cinderella squib which has rather won me over: it sounds a bit like a patched-up 'live' recording, and there are some nasty moments of ensemble (trumpets particularly) and some odd sounding balances, but it has its heart in the right place right from the start, with nary a tempo out of place. It's not a very large choir, but they acquit themselves well, and put a fair amount of effort into the chanted slogans near the end, although their Russian seems strangely accented. All in all, an auspicious start.

The coupling is No.10: I've let the disc run on, and am finding the first movement very strongly characterised, with plenty of attack. The Prague Symphony Orchestra still sounds like an eastern European band: slightly woofly horns, acidic clarinets and strong firm strings: absolutely idiomatic. If the rest of the set is up to this level, it's going to join the top contenders on performance terms. I'll need to hear it under better conditions before I can comment on the recording....