Following Elizabeth Wilson’s lecture on Shostakovich, students and faculty of the Barenboim-Said Akademie explore the “double-speak” of composers of the Soviet bloc. Out of Bach’s music, Kurtág creates delicate miniatures for two pianists. Shostakovich dedicates his brooding eighth string quartet to the victims of fascism. Gubaidulina, blacklisted in 1979 by Tikhon Khrennikov at the Sixth Congress of the Union of Soviet Composers, uses brazen electronic experimentalism in Vivente – non vivente to subvert Soviet authority. Nearly four decades after fleeing Hungary in 1956, Ligeti looks back to go forward, using Renaissance, Baroque, Eastern European folk music, and jazz to create his Sonata for Solo Viola, a capstone of the 20th century.

In addition to lectures and music, the exhibition Dry, featuring works by photographer Abdo Shanan, will be on view during the Edward W. Said Days 2020 in the lobby of the Barenboim-Said Akademie.