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In Her Hands: Chaminade, C Schumann, Pejacevic - Piano Trios

The Europadisc Review

In Her Hands: Chaminade, C Schumann, Pejacevic - Piano Trios

Neave Trio

£13.75

Among the ensembles which have consistently championed the music of women composers is the Boston-based Neave Trio. Their 2019 Chandos album, ‘Her Voice’, was a beguiling coupling of piano trios by Amy Beach, Rebecca Clarke and Louise Farrenc, while in 2024, ‘A Room of Her Own’ contained works by Lili Boulanger, Ethel Smyth and Germaine Tailleferre together with the Piano Trio no.1 by Cécile Chaminade. And the latter’s Second Piano Trio features on their new album, ‘In Her Hands’, alongside trios by Clara Schumann and Croatian composer Dora Pej... read more

Among the ensembles which have consistently championed the music of women composers is the Boston-based Neave Trio. Their 2019 Chandos album, ‘Her Voice’, was a beguiling coupling of piano trios by Am... read more

In Her Hands: Chaminade, C Schumann, Pejacevic - Piano Trios

In Her Hands: Chaminade, C Schumann, Pejacevic - Piano Trios

Neave Trio

Among the ensembles which have consistently championed the music of women composers is the Boston-based Neave Trio. Their 2019 Chandos album, ‘Her Voice’, was a beguiling coupling of piano trios by Amy Beach, Rebecca Clarke and Louise Farrenc, while in 2024, ‘A Room of Her Own’ contained works by Lili Boulanger, Ethel Smyth and Germaine Tailleferre together with the Piano Trio no.1 by Cécile Chaminade. And the latter’s Second Piano Trio features on their new album, ‘In Her Hands’, alongside trios by Clara Schumann and Croatian composer Dora Pejačević. None of the works on this latest release are new to the catalogue (the Schumann has been particularly fortunate on disc), but the Neave Trio’s trademark combination of rhythmic alertness, finely-judged balance and silky-smooth but never overbearing string tone brings out the best in them.

The disc opens with Clara Schumann’s G minor Piano Trio, op.17 (1846), composed at a stressful period, and about which the composer herself had reservations. While conceding that it contained ‘some pretty passages’, she nevertheless declared that ‘it will always be a woman’s work, always lacking in power and, here and there, inventiveness.’ Her own reluctance to include it in her own programmes suggests that there is more than just ruefulness in these observations, but we can nevertheless take them with a hefty pinch of salt. The first movement combines compelling forward momentum with broad-based, lyrical themes with striking ideas, including a fanfare-like ‘hook’ with a dotted rhythm, and an impressively worked-out development section.

The second-movement Scherzo, marked Tempo di Menuetto, is delightfully playful, its Trio section marked by cross-rhythms which no doubt appealed to the young Brahms, who performed it in Hamburg in 1854. The Andante slow movement starts with a nostalgically tinged theme on piano alone, before attaining even greater breadth when violin and then cello join in: it is gorgeous music, and every turn is savoured in the Neaves’ performance before the more animated middle section brings a mood of greater alertness. The concluding G minor Allegretto is characterised by a certain wistfulness, but also includes a gripping fugato passage; only right at the end does the music break into the major key – its effectiveness all the greater for being delayed.

Composed in 1910 at the age of twenty-five, Dora Pejačević’s Piano Trio no.2 in C major, op.29 (cast, like the Schumann, in four movements), inhabits a rich, late-Romantic soundworld. A dotted idea first heard in the opening movement becomes a recurring motif throughout the work, and there are occasional glances back to the music of Brahms and others, but it is the profusion of ideas that is perhaps its most remarkable feature. The A minor Scherzo second movement, including pizzicato passages for the strings, is altogether spikier, yet without forgoing passionate, lyrical elements; the A major Trio section has a memorably halting mood thanks to its 5/4 time signature.

The following E major ‘slow’ movement, initially marked Lento, contains frequent changes of mood and tempo, and the hallmark of this performance is how seamlessly they are integrated into the span of the whole, while relishing the expansiveness of the main theme. More assertive is the Finale, marked Allegro risoluto; dotted rhythms are again a feature, but there are some lovely lyrical passages which are treated to notably expressive playing in this performance, and the work closes (as Nigel Simeone points out in his exemplary booklet notes) ‘in a flamboyant blaze of C major.’

The album concludes with Chaminade’s three-movement Piano Trio in A minor of 1886. It is launched by a stirring main theme heard initially in octaves, and this contrasts most effectively with a gentler second theme first heard on cello, then violin, against limpid piano figuration. Though not as expansive as the first movements of the Schumann and Pejačević Trios, this Allegro moderato is developed with considerable finesse and ingenuity.

The heart of this work, however, is the E major Lento, its main theme announced by violin and cello in octaves over gently pulsating piano chords, before developing into a dialogue between the strings. A faster E minor central section brings a welcome contrast with an airy solo for piano. The Neave Trio excel themselves in this enchanting movement, combining reflectiveness with magically realised textural detail as well as sumptuous lyricism. After these delights, the concluding Allegro energico is a bracing ride, including passages which combine Mendelssohnian sparkle with Gallic sophistication. It’s a marvellous conclusion to an enthralling album, vividly recorded in Potton Hall, Dunwich, in Suffolk, last August, and most warmly recommended to all lovers of chamber music.

  • Warner & Erato
  • Hyperion
  • NIFC

The Spin Doctor Europadisc's Weekly Column

Celebrating György Kurtág’s 100th Birthday

Celebrating György Kurtág’s 100th Birthday  10th February 2026

10th February 2026

Like the rest of us mere mortals, few great composers live to celebrate their 100th birthday. Songwriter Irving Berlin (1888–1989) famously lived to the age of 101, although he retired from composing in his 70s. The widely respected American modernist master Elliott Carter (1908–2012) reached 103, and completed his last work just a few months before his death. This month sees the great Hungarian composer György Kurtág (b. 19 February 1926) mark his centenary in style, with a two-week festival of his music in Budapest, the highlight of which will be his new opera Die Stechardin, based on the letters and writings of the 18th-century German polymath Georg Christoph Lichtenberg.

Opera is a genre Kurtág has come to late in life: his only other work in the genre, Fin de partie (based on Samuel Beckett’s absurdist tragicomedy Endgame) was premiered at La Scala, Milan in 2018.... read more

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