Dmitri Shostakovich - Shostakovich Edition [27CD Box Set] (2006)

Packaged in bright USSR crimson, this 27-disc set contains the nearly all the great instrumental works by Dmitry Shostakovich: his 15 symphonies, 15 string quartets, and 6 concertos, plus his sonatas for violin, viola, cello, and piano, plus suites from his two best-known film scores and from all three of his ballet scores, plus both his jazz suites and overtures, plus his Piano Quintet, Second Piano Trio, and all five string quartet orchestrations, plus his ineffably lovely and incredibly brief Novorossisk Chimes. The best recordings here are among the best recordings of the works ever made: David Oistrakh's blazing violin concertos with Mravinsky and Rozhdestvensky and Rudolf Barshai's searing symphonies with the WDR Sinfonieorchester. Some are very good: Theodore Kuchar's thrilling ballet, film, and jazz suites with the National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine and Cristina Ortiz's exciting piano concertos. Some are respectable: the Rubio Quartet's possibly too introspective string quartets and Colin Stone's probably too extroverted piano sonatas. And some but not many are substandard -- Barshai and the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi's scrappy and lackluster performances of the string quartet orchestrations. Anyone who loves Shostakovich will surely enjoy the majority of these performances and simply skip lightly over the rest.