{"id":5242,"date":"2012-07-25T21:25:46","date_gmt":"2012-07-26T02:25:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/?p=5199"},"modified":"2012-07-25T21:25:46","modified_gmt":"2012-07-26T02:25:46","slug":"concert-review-vienna-piano-trio-mixes-passion-and-finesse-for-toronto-summer-music","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2012\/07\/25\/concert-review-vienna-piano-trio-mixes-passion-and-finesse-for-toronto-summer-music\/","title":{"rendered":"Concert review: Vienna Piano Trio mixes passion and finesse for Toronto Summer Music"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
From left: Wolfgang Redik, Stefan Mendl and Matthias Gredler of the Vienna Piano Trio played for Toronto Summer Music at Walter Hall on Wednesday night.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Exquisite barely begins to describe the glories of the all-Austrian programme the Vienna Piano Trio played for Toronto Summer Music at Walter Hall on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n

Perhaps exquisitely wrought and deeply heartfelt are better ways of describing the powerful experience of hearing three seasoned musicians, accustomed to playing together for nearly 25 years, applying a combination of intense craftsmanship, wide experience and, ultimately, what sounds like unconditional love to music from their homeland.<\/p>\n

Simply put, this was chamber music at its very best.<\/p>\n

The warmup piece on the programme was an A-Major Piano Trio<\/em>, Hob.XV:18, by Joseph Haydn. This is one of several pieces he wrote late in life that are more embellished piano sonatas than true trios.<\/p>\n

The star of this work is the pianist, and Stefan Mendl led the musical proceedings with elegance, humour and an impeccable sense of pacing.<\/p>\n

The meat of the programme came courtesy of two Romantic greats (and great friends), Johannes Brahms and Robert Schumann.<\/p>\n

Both piano trios are the biggest chestnuts of the repertoire — touchstones for budding chamber players and star vehicles for big-name soloists attempting to show off their collaborative chops.<\/p>\n

But we rarely hear Brahms’s C-Major Piano Trio No. 2<\/em>, Op. 87, which dates from 1880, and Schumann’s 1839 Piano Trio No. 1<\/em>, Op. 63, in D minor, played with as deft a mix of passion and finesse as heard from the Vienna Piano Trio.<\/p>\n

This is dense music, full of themes and their developments, wrapped in lush harmonies and interesting rhythmic interplay.<\/p>\n

Mendl and his mates, violinist Wolfgang Recik and cellist Matthias Gredler, played as one, shaping every phrase with utmost care and clarity, creating impressively gradual crescendos along the way.<\/p>\n

This was intimate music with a power to move and captivate equal to something symphonic or even operatic.<\/p>\n

Even the encore, the second movement from Schumann’s more daring third piano trio, managed to sustain the mood.<\/p>\n

This was but the latest treat in what is turning out to be an exceptional season at Toronto Summer Music.<\/p>\n

The members of the Vienna Piano Trio return with their Toronto Summer Music Academy fellows to present two concerts at Walter Hall on Saturday, at 4 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. On friday, at 10 a.m., Redik offers a public violin master class at Walter Hall, as well. All the details are here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

John Terauds<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Exquisite barely begins to describe the glories of the all-Austrian programme the Vienna Piano Trio played for Toronto Summer Music at Walter Hall on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5717,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,10,76,19,36,52,63],"tags":[6450,857,2298,6471,3356,3487,3544],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2012\/08\/parker21.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9bakr-1my","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5242"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5242\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5242"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=5242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}