DSCH motif


DSCH is a musical motif used by the composer Dmitri Shostakovich to represent himself. It is a musical cryptogram in the manner of the BACH motif, consisting of the notes D, E flat, C, B natural, or in German musical notation D, Es, C, H, thus standing for the composer's initials in German transliteration: D. Sch..

Usage

By Shostakovich

The motif occurs in many of his works, including:
Before Shostakovich used the motif, it was used by Mozart in measures 16 and 18 of his String Quartet no. 19 in C major, K. 465 in the first violin part.
Many homages to Shostakovich make extensive use of the motif.
The British composer Ronald Stevenson composed a large Passacaglia on it.
Also Edison Denisov dedicated some works to Shostakovich, by quoting the motif several times and using it as the first four notes of a twelve-tone series. Denisov was Shostakovich's protégé for a long time.
Benjamin Britten's Rejoice in the Lamb contains the DSCH motif repeated several times in the accompaniment, progressively getting louder each time, finally at fortissimo over the chords accompanying "And the watchman strikes me with his staff". The vocal text given to the motif is "silly fellow, silly fellow, is against me".
A further reference appears in Britten's The Rape of Lucretia, where the DSCH motif acts as the main structural component of Lucretia's aria "Give him this orchid."
The DSCH motif also appears in the orchestral accompaniment of Viola Concerto - in bars 115-116 and in 122-123 of the First Movement and, during the orchestral tutti before the Recapitulation of the same movement. This has never been confirmed by William Walton himself, although he did refer to Dmitri Shostakovich as "the greatest composer of the 20th century". Therefore, it is entirely possible that this was an intentional reference to the motif.
The contemporary Italian composer Lorenzo Ferrero made use of it in DEsCH, a composition for oboe, bassoon, piano and orchestra written in 2006 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Shostakovich's birth, and in Op.111 – Bagatella su Beethoven, which blends themes from the Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor, Op. 111 by Ludwig van Beethoven with the Shostakovich musical monogram.
The motif was also incorporated by Chumbawamba in "Hammer, Stirrup and Anvil", their song about Shostakovich's career under Stalin.
Danny Elfman, in his Russian influenced score for the 1995 film Dolores Claiborne, opened the film with the DSCH motif and, subsequently, used it throughout as a nod to Schostakovich's 8th String Quartet.
', the standard journal of Shostakovich studies, takes its name from the motif. "DSCH" is sometimes used as an abbreviation of Shostakovich's name.
' is a Moscow publishing house that published the 150-volume New Collected Works of Dmitri Shostakovich in 2005, 25% of which contained previously unpublished works.

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