Piano Trio (1991)

for violin, cello, and piano

2 Mvts., 20 Mins.

 

Piano Trio is available here from American Composers Alliance.

Program Notes

Piano Trio was written in the fall of 1991, and is somewhat of a transitional work.  I had returned to school to pursue my Masters, and was trying some new ideas.  I had felt my music was too predictable and needed some creative spice.  This piece was an attempt to stretch what I had been doing in a new direction.

The first movement is a rather symmetrical presentation of material with an alternately warm and cold feel; sometimes austere, sometimes luxurious, sometimes intense, sometimes wistful.  It features one of the most intense climaxes of any piece I have written, but it immediately releases to an almost music-box-like piano solo.

The second movement is a spirited contrapuntal dance.  It follows a sonata-like plan with not much of a recapitulation and a large development and coda section.  Both movements are loosely based on material drawn from tetrachords.

Though I was trying out some different ideas, I am still primarily taking a pure musical approach and not bringing extra-musical concepts into my music on purpose.  Though the material suggests different things to me, it primarily shows a composer who is trying to deal with some unrest.

Piano Trio was first performed at Arizona State University (Tempe, AZ) in April 1992, with Borovoj Martinic-Jercic violin, Richard Bock, cello, and Walter Cosand, piano.