This project degree paper is examining, analyzing and discussing the way towards the final interpretation of a piece of music. As a musician, the way to perform music on stage is always accompanied with some doubts and decisions that are made during its way to a concert performance regarding all kinds of aspects while playing. Therefore, this paper is critically viewing the factors that have an impact on musicians along the study of a piece.To be able to present the different factors Dmitri Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet in G minor op. 57 has been analyzed from the point of view of my own interpretation and the interpretation of Shostakovich himself on the piano together with two different quartets: the Beethoven and Borodin Quartet. This in order to clarify and find ways to understand the way Shostakovich himself wanted the music he produced to sound.The study showed that even though Shostakovich was very accurate with his notation in the scores, the music was performed differently depending on the musicians. Music itself is not only produced and generated by the composer likewise the musicians themselves have not only their own thoughts to consider, but also four greater factors: the musician’s technical abilities, the composer’s biography, historical knowledge and the use of both recordings and visuals to receive a more accurate understanding of the music. All this in order to produce an objectively more correct way of playing and to fulfill the intentions of the composer, which also showed can be dependent on the musicians.