Karl Eliasberg was a Russian music director known for the legendary
performance of the Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony in 1942 during the
deadly Siege of Leningrad.
He was born Karl Ilyich Eliasberg on June 10th, 1907, in Minsk, Russia.
The family moved to St. Petersburg/Leningrad. There young Eliasberg
went to the St. Petersburg conservatory. He studied violin, piano, and
conducting, graduating in 1929. During the 1930s he was music director
of the Leningrad Radio Symphony Orchestra.
In the Summer of 1941, the Nazi Wehrmacht and the Finnish Army
encircled Leningrad (St. Petersburg), the city of 3,5 million, the
fourth largest city in Europe and the main industrial center of Russia
which produced 11% of national economy. All roads south of Leningrad
were blocked by the Nazis, and all roads north of Leningrad were cut by
the Finnish Army by September 1941. Defenders and civilians in besieged
Leningrad were doomed, because there was no food, no energy, all rats,
pets and birds were eaten, unprecedented starvation led to
cannibalism... German and Finnish Armies made the encirclement of
Leningrad impenetrable from all directions, so civilian population was
dying at the rate of four to six thousand people daily.
Karl Eliasberg was a successful musician before WWII. The war changed
his life forever. He survived the siege of Leningrad during the Nazi
occupation of Russia. At that time he nearly died of starvation, but he
survived. In his effort to help the resistance, Eliasberg formed a
symphony orchestra and gave over four hundred performances for
civilians and defenders of besieged Leningrad during WWII. His music
concerts helped lift the spirits of Leningrad citizens in the time when
they were struggling to survive.
On August 9th, 1942, Eliasberg gave a premiere performance of Dmitry
Shostakovich's Seventh Symphony in besieged Leningrad. That famous
concert was made possible because Karl Eliasberg specially created an
orchestra of survivors who were still able to perform in spite of
starvation and dystrophy. The first rehearsal lasted only fifteen
minutes, because the starving musicians were exhausted. Shostakovich's
Seventh Sympathy is known to be hard to perform and for the hungry and
emaciated Leningrad musicians it was doubly so. Some of them were not
even strong enough to hold the instruments. Despite the fact that for
the period of the rehearsals which lasted two months the musicians had
their food rations increased, several of them did not live to see the
day of the concert.
In the Radio Orchestra archive, there is a fragment of an order from
the Leningrad Communist Party command with instruction to officers: 'By
any means, get a score of the Seventh from Moscow. Transport it to
Leningrad as soon as possible.' On June 2, 1942, 20-year-old pilot
Litvinov, on a light plane flying the perilous route over Nazi lines to
bring first aid, also brought the manuscripts of the Shostakovich's
Seventh. The plane landed in Leningrad safely, and the music score was
delivered to Eliasberg. 'When I saw the symphony,' Eliasberg later told
the news, 'I thought "We'll never play this." It was four thick volumes
of music.' The Shostakovich's Seventh is a colossal work demanding
battalions of strings, but what worried Eliasberg most were the
voluminous arrangements for woodwind and brass in a city short of
breath. The score had one hundred instruments and Shostakovich's
handwritten instruction: "Dedicated to heroic people of Leningrad. All
instruments must play their parts!" Eliasberg procured a list of
Leningrad musicians, of whom 25 were already blacked out, dead. Those
known to be alive were circled in red and ordered to report for duty.
The first rehearsal was a torture: the drummer collapsed on the way to
rehearsal and the leading violinist died from starvation. Those who
made it to the concert hall were unable to hold their musical
instruments longer than ten minutes.
Eliasberg who was also extremely emaciated, spent some time in hospital
in Astoria hotel and came to the rehearsals straight from the sick
ward. On the score of one of the musicians of that legendary orchestra
you can still see a drawing showing hollow-cheeked Eliasberg conducting
his orchestra sitting on a chair. The legendary performance was
broadcast live from the Bolshoi Philharmonic Hall in Leningrad, so
millions of civilians and defenders of the besieged city were able to
hear the powerful music. The symphony written in the conventional four
movements is Shostakovich's longest, and one of the longest in the
repertoire, with performances taking approximately one hour and fifteen
minutes. The scale and scope of the work is consistent with
Shostakovich's other symphonies as well as with those of composers
considered to be his strongest influences, including Bruckner, Mahler,
and Stravinsky.
Much had to be done before the Leningrad premiere could take place. The
Leningrad Radio Orchestra under Karl Eliasberg was the only remaining
symphonic ensemble. The orchestra had survived-barely-but it had not
been playing and musical broadcasts had ceased due to deadly
bombardments and air-strikes by the Nazis. At the beginning of the
siege, only warning signals and political appeals were broadcast. Even
then, there were hours of silence because of the lack of surviving
radio hosts. As for the city itself, Leningrad surrounded by the Nazis
had become a living hell, with eyewitness reports of people who had
died of cold and starvation lying in doorways in stairwells. "They lay
there because people dropped them there, the way newborn infants used
to be left. Janitors swept them away in the morning like rubbish.
Funerals, graves, coffins were long forgotten. It was a flood of death
that could not be managed. Entire families vanished, entire apartments
with their collective families. Houses, streets and neighborhoods
vanished."
The official hiatus on musical broadcasts had to end before the
symphony could be performed. This happened quickly, with a complete
about-face by Party authorities. Next was reforming the orchestra. Only
15 members were still available; the others had either starved to death
or left to fight the enemy. Posters went up, requesting all Leningrad
musicians to report to the Radio Committee. Efforts were also made to
seek out those musicians who could not come. "My God, how thin many of
them were," one of the organizers of the performance remembered. "How
those people livened up when we started to ferret them out of their
dark apartments. We were moved to tears when they brought out their
concert clothes, their violins and cellos and flutes, and rehearsals
began under the icy canopy of the studio." Orchestral players were
given additional food rations that was 250 grams of bread per day,
because no other food was available under the siege.
Before they tackled Shostakovich's work, Eliasberg had the players go
through pieces from the standard repertoire-Beethoven, Tchaikovsky,
Rimsky-Korsakov-which they also performed for broadcast. Because the
city was still blockaded at the time, the score was flown by night in
early July for rehearsal. A team of copyists worked for days to prepare
the parts despite shortages of materials. At rehearsal, some musicians
protested, not wanting to waste their little strength on an intricate
and not very accessible work. Eliasberg threatened to hold back the
additional food rations, quelling any dissent.
The concert was given on 9 August 1942. Whether this date was chosen
intentionally, it was the day Hitler had chosen previously to celebrate
the fall of Leningrad with a lavish reception for the top Nazi
commanders. But instead of Hitler's plan, all loudspeakers delivered
the live broadcast of the symphony performance throughout the city, as
well, as to the German forces in a move of psychological warfare. The
Russian commander of the Leningrad front, General Govorov, ordered a
bombardment of German artillery positions in advance of the broadcast
to ensure their silence during the performance of the symphony; a
special operation, code-named "Squall," was executed for precisely this
purpose. Three thousand high-caliber shells were lobbed onto the enemy.
Then the music of Shostakovich came out of the speakers all over the
siege perimeter, so the Nazis had to face the music.
The Bolshoi Philharmonic Hall in Leningrad, the famous cultural gem of
music, was overcrowded for the first time during the siege of
Leningrad. People dressed in their best and attended the concert
regardless of starvation and danger. Many notable survivors of the
siege were in the audience. Writer
Nikolai Tikhonov noted that in the hall
a thousand civilians were joined by several hundred soldiers: the best
defenders were rewarded with a short break from the front-lines. The
music of Shostakovich brought the much needed support and catharsis to
survivors who loved the symphony and applauded to Eliasberg and his
orchestra. General Govorov with his staff came backstage to thank
Eliasberg and his musicians for their art and courage.
The news about the premiere performance of Dmitry Shostakovich's
Seventh Symphony in besieged Leningrad spread all over the world. It
was an important message to all nations that Hitler's attack on
Leningrad failed.
Shostakovich who wrote much of his famous symphony before evacuation
from besieged Leningrad in the end of 1941, could not attend the
premier performance. The composer sent the conductor and the musicians
who performed his work in the besieged city a telegram with words of
gratitude.
Karl Eliasberg was decorated for his feat as music director who
performed for defenders of besieged Leningrad during WWII. He was also
honored as a survivor of the heroic siege of Leningrad. Eliasberg was
designated Meritorious Artist of Russia (1944) and was awarded for his
works during WWII as conductor of St. Petersburg Symphony orchestra. He
died on February 12th, 1978, and was laid to rest in Literatorskie
Moski at Volkovo cemetery in Leningrad/St. Petersburg, Russia.
Twenty years after the war, Dmitri Shostakovich invited the surviving
musicians of that legendary premiere, and there were only sixteen of
them left. It was the first time they were together in 20 years and
they were in tears. Fifty years after the war, the city of St.
Petersburg honored the surviving musicians and there were only three of
them left.
