Beethoven, Hiller & Schubert

Following their critically acclaimed debut album (Mozart Piano Trios, RES10168), the Rautio Piano Trio returns to Resonus Classics with a recording of works for piano trio by Ludwig van Beethoven, Ferdinand Hiller & Franz Schubert.

With a programme that includes the world premiere recording of Hiller’s Piano Trio No. 6 in C minor alongside Beethoven’s ‘Ghost’ Trio and Schubert’s Piano Trio in E-flat major ‘Notturno’, the Rautio Piano Trio presents three striking and individual works each notable for their use of a nocturne, evoking the quiet night-time and an atmosphere of poetic reflection.

Rautio Piano Trio

Jan Rautio piano

Jane Gordon violin

Victoria Simonson cello

 

Keeping repertoire alive is a priority for the Rautio Piano Trio as their latest CD, Beethoven, Hiller & Schubert (Resonus), demonstrates. In between fresh, brisk Beethoven (Op 70, No 1 in D major “Ghost”) and eloquent, confident Schubert (Op posth 148, D897 “Notturno”, Adagio) they offer a substantial novelty: the premiere recording of the wonderfully buoyant Piano Trio No 6 in C minor, Op 186, Serenade No 2 (1879) by Ferdinand Hiller (1811-85). Said to be an affable character, this dance-like music smiles right through.

Guardian

The Rautio Piano Trio played Mozart on period instruments for their Resonus debut (9/16). Here, in a programme of Beethoven, Hiller and Schubert, they employ modern instruments, although these new interpretations display strikingly similar qualities of classical poise, deftness and textural clarity. The Rautio’s approach is a godsend in Ferdinand Hiller’s Sixth Trio (1879). Hiller was a significant musical figure in his day, and this premiere recording of the Trio is worth a listen.

The Rautio’s delicate, easy-flowing performance of Schubert’s Notturno is lovely. There are delights in Beethoven’s Ghost Trio, too – at the end of the first-movement exposition (starting at 1’13”), for instance, where the players seem to be scurrying nimbly on tiptoe, and in the elegantly effervescent finale.

Gramophone

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