August 30, 2019

  • New Music for String Trio

     

    Moto Quarto
    Trio Casals: Sylvia Ahramjian, violin. Ovidiu Marinescu, cello. Anna Kislitsyna, piano.
    Navona Records 6237
    Disc One: Total Time:  60:21
    Recording:   ****/****
    Performance: ****/****

    Trio Casals returns with this fourth collection of contemporary chamber music.  As with their last stunning release, Moto Bello, the launch of this album coincided with a performance at Carnegie Hall. There are two multi-movement works here coupled with seven brief pieces for the trio, or as solo works.

    The album begins with the three-movement Three for Three (2018) by David Nisbet Stewart.  A brief “Jitterbug” kicks off the work referencing the classic popular WWII dance craze and a wicked piano line.  The central “Pastorale” is a more lyrical section for contrast before a three-part scherzo wraps things up.  Joanne D. Carey’s single movement Piano Trio No. 2 features three unique thematic ideas that are then explored motivically throughout the piece which has a rondo-like form.  Later, Clare Shore’s Day Tripping creates soundscapes that depict natural vistas from Florida’s Peace River in her opening “Peace at Dawn” to Juniper Springs in “Juniper Run.”

    There are two works for solo cello.  The first of these is Dark Radiance by UK composer Emma-Ruth Richards.  She takes her interest in contrasts, inspired a bit by the way light is often connected to trumpets and then explores how this transfers into the expansive registral possibilities of the cello.  The Poem by Christopher Brakel uses the work of madrigalist Carlo Gesualdo as inspiration for his brief essay here.

    Descriptive titles help provide listeners an entry point in the other single movement works on the album.  In Allyson Wells’ Since Then, the work refers to an unfortunate breakup of a quartet when a member left.  The resulting trio is now represented as a sense of loss and regret in this new version for Trio Casals which features intriguing motivic writing integrated across the three parts.  Touching lyrical writing is also notable.  L . Peter Deutsch uses the formal structure of traditional sonata-allegro form for his brief trio, “Sunset at Montelimar”.  The two themes are shifted between each of the instruments throughout the work reflecting the composer’s own reminiscing of his day in Southern France in this more traditional-sounding work of beauty.  Suspension of Disbelief by Keith Kramer introduces explorations of scales and resulting harmonies found in Japanese and Hindustani musics resulting in more modern hybrid of global and traditional music.  The album then concludes with Mathew Fuerst’s Totentanz, a highly-conceptualized exploration of the Dies irae chant.  The piece is created through mathematical constructs.

    As with their previous releases, Trio Casals covers a lot of diverse musical voices.  Much of the music this time features a more modernist and atonal quality though there are certainly moments of great lyricism and traditional harmony hovering at the edges.  The performances are committed and engaging.  Certainly this is another great release for enthusiasts of chamber music and introduces a host of new musical voices as well.