Recommended Shostakovich?


I recently heard a performance of the Shostakovich Concerto for Piano, Trumpet and Strings for the first time and I have decided I need to discover more of his music. I'd appreciate any recommendations for memorable pieces, performances and sonics, including good box sets. Thanks to all.
77jovian
The piece you mention is nicely done by Marriner/ASMF, Ogdon -pf, Wilbraham -tpt on Argo/Decca

Other nice performances in good sonics:
Pf Trio 1 and 2, Oslo Trio, Simax
String Quartet No. 8, Borodin Qt, Decca
String Quartets, Fitzwilliam Qt, Decca (L'Oiseau Lyre)
Sym 1, Martinon/LSO, RCA (recorded and possibly re-released by Decca)
Sym 5, 6, 7 and 11, Berglund/BournemouthSO, EMI
Sym 10, Karajan/BerlinPO, DGG - ONLY the early 1960s performance
The Age of Gold (Ballet Suite), Martinon/LSO, RCA (recorded and possibly re-released by Decca)
Festive Overture, Ancerl/CzechPO, Supraphon
.
I am a fan of his 24 preludes and fugues by Gilels, his architecture is amazing, he never did a complete set but you can often find a few here and there.
the same goes for Richter. Amazingly they seemed to prefer to do ones the other didn't. Between them they almost have a complete set.
The Kitajenko boxed set on Capriccio are pretty good accounts of the symphonies and are very good sounding SACDs. I also have the Barshai boxed set on Brilliant and the Mariss Jansons boxed set on EMI. All 3 sets are winners, but the Capriccio wins hands down on sound quality.
The quartets are special! On a par with the quartets of Beethoven, in my humble opinion. The Fitzwilliam mentioned above is good. I suggest you give the St. Lawrence 3,7, &8 on EMI a try. I think they have the spirit of these works right. It is not polite. It is not comfortable. It is the music of a man tormented by Stalin. Also check out the Fitzwilliam/Ashkenazy piano quintet (Decca), and the piano trio #2 (Ma, Axe, and Stern) if you can find it.