MusicWeb International One of the most grown-up review sites around 2024
60,000 reviews
... and still writing ...

Search MusicWeb Here Acte Prealable Polish CDs
 

Presto Music CD retailer
 
Founder: Len Mullenger                                    Editor in Chief:John Quinn             

Some items
to consider

new MWI
Current reviews

old MWI
pre-2023 reviews

paid for
advertisements

Acte Prealable Polish recordings

Forgotten Recordings
Forgotten Recordings
All Forgotten Records Reviews

TROUBADISC
Troubadisc Weinberg- TROCD01450

All Troubadisc reviews


FOGHORN Classics

Alexandra-Quartet
Brahms String Quartets

All Foghorn Reviews


All HDTT reviews


Songs to Harp from
the Old and New World


all Nimbus reviews



all tudor reviews


Follow us on Twitter


Editorial Board
MusicWeb International
Founding Editor
   
Rob Barnett
Editor in Chief
John Quinn
Contributing Editor
Ralph Moore
Webmaster
   David Barker
Postmaster
Jonathan Woolf
MusicWeb Founder
   Len Mullenger


Support us financially by purchasing this from

Ludwig van BEETHOVEN (1770-1827)
Piano Trio in C minor Op.1 No.3 (1793) [29:57]
Piano Trio in B flat, Op. 97, Archduke (1811) [43’38]
Vienna Piano Trio
rec. 2019, Konzerthaus der Abtei Marienmünster
MDG 942 2155-6 SACD [73:35]

These two favourites among Beethoven’s piano trios have been frequently paired and recorded and a new recording would have to be special to displace established choices. Fortunately, these performances meet every criterion of excellence in regard to sound and execution; the Vienna Piano Trio is among the most celebrated of its kind, playing with the kind of homogeneity and rapport which comes from long-standing interaction and experience. Here, they follow up their recording of the Op.70 piano trios with a second top-quality issue, including the most famous of Beethoven’s works in that genre. Vibrato is present but restrained, judiciously applied rather than lavished on the music and the plush, sumptuous tone of the string instruments – a 1761 Gagliagno violin and a Stradivari cello from 1698 - is much is evidence.

It is easy to hear why the youthful Op. 1 No. 3 caught Haydn’s attention and continues to be so favoured, especially when it is played as winningly as per here. The chordal punctuations of the first movement are given full emphasis but the flowing, virtuosic runs of the variations could not be more delicately articulated. The elegantly arpeggiated minuet is similarly winning and the prestissimo finale positively sparkles before its arrestingly unexpected and abrupt fade-out conclusion – something unique in the output of a composer renowned for gloriously protracted codas.

The Archduke is a more substantial work than the brilliantly effervescent C minor trio by the young Beethoven, as befits befitting the creation of a man in middle-aged maturity, and requires a weightier, more elevated manner; the Vienna Trio bring to it the requisite sombre gravity. The dense counterpoint of the academic yet tuneful Scherzo is expertly executed. The stately cantabile slow movement of variations weaves its slow, exquisite spell of enchantment convincingly and the exuberant finale bounces along in Schubertian mode as if neither its composer nor those playing his work had a care in the world.

Ralph Moore

Performers: David McCarroll (violin); Clemens Hagen (cello); Stefan Mendl (piano)



Advertising on
Musicweb


Donate and keep us afloat

 

New Releases

Naxos Classical
All Naxos reviews

Chandos recordings
All Chandos reviews

Hyperion recordings
All Hyperion reviews

Foghorn recordings
All Foghorn reviews

Troubadisc recordings
All Troubadisc reviews



all Bridge reviews


all cpo reviews

Divine Art recordings
Click to see New Releases
Get 10% off using code musicweb10
All Divine Art reviews


All Eloquence reviews

Lyrita recordings
All Lyrita Reviews

 

Wyastone New Releases
Obtain 10% discount

Subscribe to our free weekly review listing