A very well chosen title for Valerio Cappelli upcoming show at the Malibran Theatre, due September 12: Gli occhiali di Šostakovič, (lit. ‘Shostakovich’s spectacles’). On one side, a reference to the short-sighted composer’s signature thick lenses in dark frames, on the other, the ambition to show Shostakovich’s life with no constrictive ideological filters. An apparently simple man forced to make ends meet as a composer in very difficult times for a musician and intellectual. Born in Saint Petersburg in 1906, he authored his first compositions as early as 1915. The child prodigy lost his father as an adolescent, and had to take a job accompanying silent movies at the piano. Dmitri Dmitriyevich loved film, was part of the Soviet intelligentsia, and shocked Venice with his Lady Macbeth in 1960. Actor Sergio Rubini, also an appreciated director and dramatist, will beautifully render all these different faces of the Russian composer.
