Piano Trios by Brahms & Schubert

Brahms very much admired Schubert and was influenced by his mastery of chamber music. He even edited and championed Schubert’s works, and his Piano Trio in C minor can be seen as a late-Romantic response to Schubert’s early Romantic ideals. Brahms wrote this trio – his last for violin, cello, and piano – during the summer of 1886, which he spent on Lake Thun in Switzerland. From the windows of his room, Brahms could look out over the lake to the immense glaciers of the Bernese Highlands, and many believe that the power of that rugged view made itself felt in the music Brahms composed there. The Piano Trio in C minor certainly communicates tension from its opening instant.

Schubert’s Piano Trio in E-flat was the only one of his large-scale and serious instrumental works that was actually published before his death. This trio shows the range of Schubert’s invention, in the dramatic announcement of the first theme, and in the rich melodies which follow it to its jubilant end.

Program

Brahms Piano Trio in Cm., Op. 101
Schubert Piano Trio in E-flat, D.929

Louisa Stonehill – Violin, Thomas Mesa – Cello & Nicholas Burns – Piano