Polish Pianist Rafał Blechacz and Korean violinist Bomsori Kim began their fascinating musical partnership in 2016. In early 2019 they released an album of Polish and French music for DG. Watch a recent concert recital with a program featuring a sonata for violin and piano from Mozart and Beethoven as well as fascinating duo arrangements of famous solo piano works by Liszt, Debussy and Chopin.
Recorded at the beautiful Haydnsaal in the Esterházy Palace in Eisenstadt, Austria, where Haydn worked for nearly thirty years, Grigory Sokolov presents a meticulously assembled program of Haydn and Schubert. Known for his dedication to his repertoire in concert, he requests the audience to abstain from applause in-between each of Haydn’s Sonatas so as to allow the recital to flow uninterrupted. It is difficult not to be completely enveloped in his playing; Grigory Sokolov is truly one of the finest pianists of our time.
An offspring of the Baroque trio sonata, the piano trio—usually denoting a work for piano, violin, and cello—was still in its infancy when Beethoven penned his first essay in the genre around 1791. Although he declined to assign an opus number to the early Trio in E-flat major (which would be published posthumously in 1830), the composer reportedly considered it “one of his worthiest experiments in the art of composition.”
Daniel Barenboim founded his trio with his son Michael Barenboim and the cellist Kian Soltani in 2016. The ensemble made its debut that same year at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires and in the 2017–18 season first performed Beethoven’s complete piano trios at the Pierre Boulez Saal Berlin, combined with contemporary works. In the same hall, the Daniel Barenboim Trio recorded these two concerts performing the seven piano trios, just right before the Covid-19 pandemic in December 2019.
Daniel Barenboim founded his trio with his son Michael Barenboim and the cellist Kian Soltani in 2016. The ensemble made its debut that same year at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires and in the 2017–18 season first performed Beethoven’s complete piano trios at the Pierre Boulez Saal Berlin, combined with contemporary works. In the same hall, the Daniel Barenboim Trio recorded these two concerts performing the seven piano trios, just right before the Covid-19 pandemic in December 2019.
Throughout his life, Beethoven amused himself (and supplemented his income) by composing variations on popular tunes of the day, from patriotic tub-thumpers like “Rule Britannia” to operatic arias by Mozart and Salieri and an unpretentious waltz by Anton Diabelli. In 1816, he offered the Leipzig publisher Breitkopf & Hartel first dibs on a set of variations for piano trio on the song “Ich bin der Schneider Kakadu” (I am the tailor Kakadu), which he disarmingly described as “one of my earlier compositions, though it is not among the reprehensible ones.” Precisely when Beethoven wrote this charming jeu d’esprit is unknown, but its origins may go back two decades or more.