Carl Reinecke (1824-1910)
Piano Trio Op. 38 in D (1851)
Serenade, Op. 126, No. 1 (1873)
Serenade, Op. 126, No. 2 (1873)
Piano Trio No. 2 Op. 230 in C minor (1895)
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Triple Concerto Op. 56 (arr. for piano trio, Reinecke 1866-7)
Hyperion Trio
rec. Klaus-von-Bismarck-Saal, WDR Funkhaus, Köln, 2019
CPO 555 476-2 [2 CDs: 122]
Sporadic attempts to revive Carl Reinecke's music on record - the '70s saw two recordings of his Second Piano Concerto - have not been successful, despite the music's appeal. It's unfailingly melodic as well as dramatic, in the way of much Austro-German fare. It deploys standard harmonic and motivic tropes of its time, but still "speaks" in a distinctive voice, even as it reflects the stylistic tics of more familiar composers.
Schumannesque rippling piano figures dominate the first Piano Trio: they don't just sound pretty, but provide a firm impulse for the arching string phrases above. There's also a hint of Mendelssohn - a more firmly grounded variety - in the first movement's searching, lyrical sweetness. The Andante begins in sombre piano octaves, growing more impassioned as it proceeds; the Vivace ma non troppo sounds like it should be a scherzo, but it's really a menuet in eighth notes. In the Allegro brillante finale, the dotted rhythms of the bounding first theme continue, moving the second theme forward; after some turmoil, the music emerges triumphant. A peculiar structural quirk is that the movements end almost curtly, without either a gradual winding down or cadential repetitions: Reinecke says what he has to say, rounds it off quickly, and stops.
The two Serenades tip the First Trio's aesthetic more strongly towards Schumann, especially in the first Serenade's Intermezzo, where the key motif keeps starting mid-bar and crosses the barlines, and in the Canon of the second, heartfelt and then agitated. Each Serenade, though about half the length of the First Trio, is a full-fledged four-movement work. The variations of the second Serenade's five-minute finale, despite their relative brevity, explore styles ranging from sprightly uplift, through yearning legato, to buoyant instability.
The C minor Trio reaches a bit further forward. After a brief eruption of Lisztian turbulence, the Allegro first movement settles into a broadly "open" major key. The Andante sostenuto's autumnal lyricism and some of the Finale's bounding energy nod to Brahms, as does a general reliance on harmonic cross-relations; only the scherzo is more or less conventional. At times, the rhetoric threatens to get out of hand, but there's enough structural rigor to keep everything within bounds.
With the Beethoven Triple Concerto, we hear an immediate gravitas missing from Reinecke's original compositions. It's unclear why the latter chose to arrange the piece thus - the program note is unforthcoming - but it comes off better than I'd expected. If you listen carefully, the reductions of the full orchestral passages do sound subtly different from the trio's original concertato passages. The central Largo sings with dignity, proceeding attacca to the vigorous finale. Still, as in the original, there's too much of everything. It's a hazard in this sort of large-scale concerto, with the double exposition and all: you think the first movement is ending, but we're just waving at the development.
The playing is first-class all around. Pianist Hagen Schwarzrock is particularly to be commended for consistently beautiful, limpid articulations, and for his ability to subordinate himself to the strings without sacrificing depth of tone. They play the Beethoven arrangement rather deliberately; everyone struggles slightly in the concertante passages - they're actually more demanding than the full-orchestra reductions - but it all works fine. The recorded sound is gorgeous.
Stephen Francis Vasta
stevedisque.wordpress.com/blog
