Shostakovich: Tahiti Trot, Op.16

Introduction

Tahiti Trot, Op. 16, is Dmitri Shostakovich's 1927 orchestration of an arrangement of "Tea for Two" from the musical No, No, Nanette by Vincent Youmans. It had previously been arranged by the composer Boris Fomin (1900-1948) for inclusion in his operetta "The Career of Pierpont Blake" (Карьера Пирпойнта Блэка) in 1926, with Russian lyrics by Konstantin Podrevsky (1888-1930), who had given the new lyrics the title "Tahiti Trot."

Shostakovich wrote it in response to a challenge from conductor Nikolai Malko: after the two listened to the song "Tahiti Trot" on record at Malko's house, Malko bet 100 roubles that Shostakovich could not completely re-orchestrate the song from memory in under an hour. Shostakovich took him up and won, completing the orchestration in around 45 minutes.

Tahiti Trot was first performed in Moscow on 25 November 1928, and has been a popular encore ever since. It was used as an entr'acte for the ballet The Golden Age at the suggestion of conductor Aleksandr Gauk.