Brightmusic Chamber Ensemble

Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809), Piano Trio in G Major, XV:25 “Gypsy”

Franz Joseph Haydn was an important Austrian composer of the Classical period. He spent much of his career as a court musician for the wealthy Esterhazy family at their Eszterhaza Castle in Eisenstadt. He was instrumental in the development of chamber music such as the string quartet and piano trio. His contributions to musical form have led him to be called "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet".  He was also affectionately known to many of his colleagues as “Papa Haydn”.

The Piano Trio in G Major (Hob. XV:25) was written in 1795 during the final few weeks of Haydn's second trip to London, and is one of a set of three (Hob. XV:24–26) dedicated to Rebecca Schroeter. It is perhaps his best-known piano trio and is sometimes nicknamed the "Gypsy" trio because of its finale in “Hungarian” style which includes a number of gypsy tunes and gypsy effects (strumming accompaniments and left-hand pizzicato).  Rosemary Hughes describes the first movement as "a curious but charming blend of double-variation and rondo, for the two minor sections are extremely free in their connection either with the major main theme or with each other”.  The alternation of variations in major and minor keys is characteristic of Haydn.

David Baker (1931-2016), Roots II Piano Trio

David Nathaniel Baker Jr. was an American jazz composer, conductor, and musician from Indianapolis. He was a Professor of Jazz Studies at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music from 1966-2013.  He was the music school's second African-American faculty member and its sole jazz studies instructor for his first ten years at the school. From 1991 to 2012, he was Conductor and Musical and Artistic Director for the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra in Washington DC.  He has more than 65 recordings, 70 books, and 400 articles to his credit.

The Roots II Piano Trio is a suite based on African-American idioms. According to Baker, the trio draws from a wide pool of pop styles, including “work songs, field hollers, blues, ragtime, boogie-woogie, rhythm and blues, spirituals, gospel songs, calypso, rock ‘n’ roll, rap, and of course jazz,” though it’s in a venerable classical form, as if it were striving for concert-hall grandeur. The work was premiered by the famous Beaux Arts Trio in 1993 at the Library of Congress.

Bedrich Smetana (1824-1884), Piano Trio in G Minor, Op. 15

Bedrich Smetana was a Czech composer who pioneered the development of a musical style that became closely identified with his people's aspirations to a cultural and political "revival". He has been regarded in his homeland as the father of Czech music. Internationally he is best known for his 1866 opera “The Bartered Bride” and for the symphonic cycle “Ma Vlast” ("My Fatherland"), which portrays the history, legends and landscape of the composer's native Bohemia.

The Piano Trio in G Minor was written initially as his Opus 9.  There were mixed feelings in the initial 1855 premiere, but Franz Liszt had enjoyed it separately when paying a visit to Smetana in Bohemia. Motivated by Liszt's endorsement, Smetana revised his work to a much warmer reception in Sweden in 1858. It was finally published in 1880 as Opus 15 and was dedicated to the memory of his eldest daughter Bedřiška. 

The work is in three movements.  The first movement follows a sonata form beginning with a 7-measure violin solo that is in the lowest register, and the themes are drawn from the richness of Smetana’s Slavic background. The second movement is marked “Allegro, ma non agitato”...maybe not “agitated” but still full of rhythmic energy and dynamic contrasts. The final movement continues with a very spirited “Presto”.  This later abruptly transitions to a beautiful and somber funeral march, before finally moving again to the restatement of earlier themes to end the piece in an almost “triumphant” fashion. 

Program notes by Larry Reed