Newsfilter: Someone is clearly nostalgic for the good old days of the Iron Curtain.
posted on Aug 18, 2007 - View this thread

Shostakovichiana. Documents and articles about one of the twentieth century's greatest composers, some of them focusing on the problems he encountered working under a totalitarian system. Some highlights :- 'Do not judge me too harshly': anti-Communism in Shostakovich's letters; 'You must remember!': Shostakovich's alleged 1937 interrogation; About Shostakovich's 1948 downfall. More related material can be found at the Music under Soviet Rule page.
There are a number of interesting sites dealing with music expression and censorship generally. The US Holocaust Memorial Museum has a site on the music of the concentration camps - 'While popular songs dating from before the war remained attractive as escapist fare, the ghetto, camp, and partisan settings also gave rise to a repertoire of new works. ' Here's a Guardian article on the Blue Notes, who 'fought apartheid in South Africa with searing jazz'. Here's a page about the Drapchi 14, Tibetan nuns who 'recorded independence songs and messages to their families on a tape recorder' (and were subsequently punished). Finally, a page on records which were banned from BBC radio during the 1991 Gulf War (example :- 'Walk Like an Egyptian').
posted on Mar 26, 2003 - View this thread

Give It Up for MC Zhirinovsky Flamboyant Russian ultra-nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky, renowned for his controversial views on Iraq, has had his words turned into an anti-war rap song. The song, titled "Don't you dare go shooting at Baghdad", is being launched on the internet, according to the Russian television station TVS.
posted on Feb 26, 2003 - View this thread

50 Russian diplomats expelled from the US on suspicion of being spies. Discuss...
posted on Mar 22, 2001 - View this thread

Ask Putin. At 15.00 GMT today, Vladimir Putin will answer questions posed by the public live online. Two Russian journalists and one from the BBC will select the questions, you can submit yours here. Accountability or Publicity on the part of Putin?
posted on Mar 6, 2001 - View this thread