Classical Music | Violin Music

Franz Schubert

Trio for Piano and Strings No. 1 in B-flat Major, Op.99, D.898  Play

Robyn Bollinger Violin
Tony Rymer Cello
Kwan Yi Piano

Recorded on 07/19/2012, uploaded on 01/15/2013

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

        Allegro moderato
        Andante un poco mosso
        Scherzo: Allegro
        Rondo: Allergro vivace

Schubert's music draws the listener in and has enduring lessons for composers and players. As Morton Feldman observed of Schubert's placing of melody, "It's not a question of periods, just where he places it is so fantastic with the atmosphere. It just floats. It's within our reach but it's someplace no one else would put the melody in terms of registration. There is a lot to learn in Schubert, just where he puts things. He is so effortless."

Alfred Brendel's characterization of Schubert vis-a-vis his near contemporary, Beethoven, is well known: "In Beethoven's music we never lose our bearings, we always know where we are; Schubert, on the other hand, puts us into a dream. Beethoven composes like an architect, Schubert like a sleepwalker."

Franz Schubert's two great piano trios - in B-flat Major, Op. 99, and in E-flat Major, Op. 100, were written in 1827. The Trio in B-flat Major is an essentially lyrical composition, warmly and luminously beautiful. None of its four movements reveals the spiritual tensions, or is darkened by the chilling shadows, that are so typical of the works dating from the composer's last years.

The first movement, Allegro moderato, in a sonata form whose regularity is an exception for Schubert, seems to give voice to the most genuine joy in people making music together, whereas the following Andante un poco mosso, in E-flat Major, truly possesses what Schumann described as "the visionary quality of a dream of beatitude."

In the Scherzo we discover echoes of ländler and Viennese waltzes; whereas the final Allegro vivace is in a rondo form rich in subordinate episodes and demonstrates - according to Alfred Einstein - a clear-cut thematic relationship to the lied "Skolie", written by Schubert in 1815. This lied begins with the following words, which could easily describe the Allegro vivace (and the Trio as a whole): "On a bright May morning, let us enjoy the flower's brief life, before all its fragrance disappears."

The B-flat Trio was never performed publicly nor published during Schubert's lifetime. A private performance was given in Vienna on January 28, 1827 with the piano part taken by Carl Maria von Bocklet, a pianist, violinist, and friend of the composer, who first brought many of Schubert's compositions to the public notice. The string parts were taken by Ignaz Schuppanzigh, violin, and Josef Linke on cello, both members of the Schuppanzigh Quartet - Beethoven's quartet of choice.   Tecchler Trio


Steans Music Institute

The Steans Music Institute is the Ravinia Festival's professional studies program for young musicians.