Ránki – Stark – Devich: Piano Trios II. / Mozart and Tchaikovsky

Ránki – Stark – Devich: Piano Trios II. / Mozart and Tchaikovsky

Featuring:
János Mátyás Stark – violin
Gergely Devich – cello
Fülöp Ránki – piano

The 2023 chamber music series by Fülöp Ránki, János Mátyás Stark and Gergely Devich will crown each of the four seasons with a concert at the BMC Concert Hall. The young artists will perform a selection of outstanding masterpieces from the piano trio repertoire, from Mozart to Ravel. The first three concerts feature two trios, sometimes highlighting the diversity and variety of the works, sometimes their commonalities, while the fourth programme includes a duo sonata, a testament to the musicians' long-standing duo collaborations.

Beneath the vernal cheerfulness lurks an almost Schubertian sadness in Mozart's translucent Trio in E major, which the debt-ridden composer completed in 1788, along with his last three symphonies, and probably intended for home performance. E major is an extremely unusual choice in Mozart's oeuvre, and not only is it difficult to tell whether the themes are joyful or melancholic, but the surprising harmonic turns also reveal dark shadows.
The tone of Tchaikovsky's lengthy Trio in A minor alternates euphoria, tragedy, elegy and pathos. Although the composer claimed that the violin-cello-piano combination was incompatible, he was the first Russian composer to set his mind to writing a trio, both yielding to the urging of his patron and commemorating the deceased Nikolai Rubinstein.