Curdled can-cans; minced marches; wobbly waltzes; acrid quotes from Offenbach and the French Revolution: Shostakovich presses them together in a collage alternately dizzy and desolate, spiritedly performed by Mark Fitz-Gerald and the Basel Sinfonietta. Fitz-Gerald uses his own edition of the score, prepared after careful research. The joy of it lies in the light instrumentation for 18 players

this superbly performed rendition...enhanced by vividly realistic sound and extensive booklet notes from four Shostakovich specialists, makes the strongest case for a score that, in terms of the film medium, its composer equalled only rarely and which he arguably never surpassed.

[The New Babylon] was the last gasp of this anything-goes era, and boasted a blistering score by the 22-year-old Shostakovich. So blistering, in fact, that nobody could perform it, and it was “lost” for decades...it is sardonic, brittle and laden with saucy Offenbach quotes. But two discs’ worth of dazzling freneticism is too much.