Just to get this straight to start with, I heard a lovely concert by locally-based Trillium, a trio of first-rate musicians: pianist Robert Bonham, violinist Alison Maerker Garner and cellist Alicia Randisi-Hooker, in the Harold and Jean Lambert Recital Hall at the Clayton Center for the Performing Arts on the campus of Maryville College last evening. They are a classical piano trio. But they are not the Trillium Piano Trio, an Ohio-based ensemble of the same three instruments (in case the internet tries to fool you).
Trillium also differs in another fundamental way. All three are educators, as well as gifted musicians, with hearts set on both delighting audiences with gorgeous presentations and bringing them into the wonderful world of classical music by helping their audiences understand and appreciate the nuances of the music they play.
We live in a society that is getting less and less formal. (All one has to do is remember last year’s presidential campaign to know that.) So the age is passing when audiences expect to come to concerts, sit in silence, except for the accepted applause moments set by concert etiquette, with absolutely no talking from the stage allowed. Musicians are to be seen and heard, but definitely not heard from.
Many of the people who went to concerts during the period of rigid concert behavior are, themselves, passing away, as well.
So, Trillium’s mission of attracting new audiences to the art form by bringing them inside the music is just right for the times.
Last night’s concert was a progression of three works in chronological order, beginning with Johann Christian Bach’s “Piano Trio in D Major,” Op. 2, No. 3, written around 1763. It’s the third in a set of six, composed by the 11th surviving child of Johann Sebastian Bach and his first son.
Written when J.C. Bach was only 28, its two movements are light, charming and straight-forward, without any of the busy trills and fussiness that characterized his father’s music. Trillium’s presentation of it was full of delight and joy.
A rarely heard three-movement “Duet in G Major, for Violin and Cello,” Hob. VI:DI, written by Franz Joseph Haydn in 1773, followed the Bach. Played by Garner and Randisi-Hooker, it’s a kind of musical conversation, the underlying concept of most chamber music.
Pianist Bonham talked about the character of both of these pieces before each was played.
Then came the big piece, the reason this concert was put together in the first place, Beethoven’s sizable (time-wise) “Piano Trio in B Flat,” Op. 97, known as the “Archduke,” after Beethoven’s dedication to Archduke Rudolph, younger brother of Austrian Emperor Joseph and Beethoven’s personal friend, as well as his student.
Written in 1811, it is regarded as one of the grandest in the entire piano trio repertoire. It’s also grand in scope. Getting a grip on it for both the musicians and the audience takes breaking it down into comprehendible bites.
Bonham began his discussion of the construction and themes of the piece by first asking violinist Garner to play the simple notes of the first theme. It’s quite hummable, if you set our mind to it, and easily identifiable when it’s heard during performance.
One by one, Bonham pointed out the sounds and fragments Beethoven used in assembling this masterpiece, including singing birds, played by the piano, that Beethoven reused from his recently written Pastoral Symphony, finished just three years before the trio.
After explanations of some of the humor Beethoven put in the fourth movement, including the musical equivalent of a poke in the ribs and moments of out-right musical laughter, the playing of the “Trio” got underway.
Well played, for their first go at such a big piece, Trillium’s gorgeous playing of the “Andante cantabile” third movement, was nothing short of a meditative prayer. It and the opening movement have been called the “noblest music ever penned.”
Then came the fun in the raucous “Allegro moderato – Presto,” fourth movement that’s just simply “a good time is had by all.”