Maurice Ravel-Piano Trio in A minor + Sheets

-Movements

1. Modéré, 0:00

2. Pantoum (Assez vif), 9:52

3. Passacaille: Trés large, 14:23

4. Final: Animé, 21:30

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-Artists

Menuhin-Violin
Cassadó-Cello
Kentner-Piano

Rec-1960

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Score-

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The trio opens with a movement marked modéré, a sonata whose dreamy themes in a modal cast spaciously float in a surprisingly placid sequence that is more suggestive than argumentative, dream rather than discourse. There are two clear themes. The first is rhythmic, brief and somewhat dark, the second delicate, lyrical and bright, both familiar as Ravel's poetic language. The development focuses chiefly on the first, returns into the gentle dawn of the second and obliquely concludes with elements of both drawn into new harmonic reaches that feel resolved and fully realized in spite of the astonishingly spacious neutrality into which the music melts.

Next comes a glittering scherzo charged with brilliant rhythm and color that immediately recalls a similarly remarkable scherzo in Ravel's quartet. The distinctive sonorities are formed by combinations of pizzicato, octave doublings in the strings and the illuminated writing for piano that first made Ravel famous. These techniques combined with the string trills, harmonics and tremolos found in the other movements describe the deliciously innovative palette from which both Ravel and Debussy painted their musical epiphanies. It is truly amazing that the innovative and complex writing for piano demands the utmost virtuosity yet blends so perfectly without overwhelming the chamber textures. Indeed, Ravel is among the few great originators of new ensemble sonorities. The title "pantoum" refers to a Malaysian form of poetic verse adopted by a variety of French writers of the period and applied here to purely musical language by a most ingenious Ravel. Three different themes alternate and shift positions according to a precise literary plan across multiple stanzas. While following this scheme, Ravel still maintains the clear and simple structure of a scherzo and trio, a ternary form like the Bergerettes.

The third, slow movement is titled Passacaille, the French equivalent to the Italian Passacaglia, an old Baroque theme and variations form built around a ground bass melody that recurs through ever changing contexts. Ravel composed a brilliant eightmeasure theme of ponderous beauty that begins low in the piano, climbs up into the cello, rises soulfully with the violin and continues to be ceremoniously exchanged among the intimately entwined players in a long line that swells and sinks with subtle but profound intensity. Sparse and remote, the misty lament is treated to an especially poignant treatment by a string duo with ancient-sounding hollow harmonies and a final jagged contemplation in the deepest rage of the solo piano, a return to the primordial ground bass. Haunting and timeless, this is the trio's unforgettable center of gravity.

Several commentators have described Ravel's predicament in finishing the trio: with the sudden outbreak of WWI, he became nearly manically compelled to wrap up the composition in order to enlist in military service. Ravel described his own final effort as driven by "insane heroic rage." The music is bright and energetic without any traces of anger, but many argue that the finale's initial promise may have been compromised by haste or distraction. It begins with one of the grandest splashes of color in the literature with compelling new sonorities. The meter alternates between 5/4 and 7/4, unusual time signatures drawn from Basque influence. A wash of triumphant gestures swirl up and down dynamic arcs in a fantasia of shifting tempi. The unmistakably conclusive wave is punctuated by the brief recurrent motif featuring a dotted-rhythm and the fundamental stepwise whole note turns that characterize the themes of all four movements in a typically French but especially subtle cyclic recall. There is energy and sweep but some lament a loss of focus on precise chamber textures as the piano trio strains, through smoke and mirrors, to evoke the grandeur of an orchestra. Yet it is all extraordinary chamber psychedelia. After the variety of meticulous form, mood and motion in the previous movements, the last is a welcome gust, free and wild, a flurry in the wake of a man suddenly called into urgent action on another front.

© Kai Christiansen and Music at Kohl Mansion. All rights reserved.

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[yannd]

The idea of 7/4 time signature + the range of texture in the finale creates probably the most intense impression of the whole chamber repertoire. Sounds like a whole orchestra. Extatic.

[DrStabkill]

That third movement changed the music I wrote forever after I heard it.

[grantveebeejay]

This trio has all one needs: Magic, elegance, rhythm, fleetness, majesty, delicacy, taste, craft. Something to aspire to. Grand merci M.Ravel!

[thepians]

24:23- 25:04 my favorite moment of the all trio, so much intense!!!

[lorddorogoth]

I love the emotion from the third movement.

[thecozytrader]

Ravel, just the best ochestrator that ever lived on this earth, pure genius, i just can't describe how genius and deep this third mov. is, truly magical.

[irovknbsefkbewbe]

This absolutely beautiful piece made me cry when I listened to it for the first time.

[freethinkin]

7:00 just completely melts me every time! Who else would think to harmonize a pentatonic melody like that. Thank you Ravel!!

[classicalmusic]

Majestic music. One of the finest within the genre, in my opinion.

[qazzaz]

9:16 - 9:50 is such a unique sound on the cello.

[DavidAndersen]

Imagine if this work didn't exist. How greyer and colder the world would be.

[theodoreconstantini]

Expresses a powerful sense of wistfulness and longing.

[christianvennemann]

My newest classical-music earworm, especially the second and final movements 😍😍 (parts of the final movement even sound like precursors to Ravel's Piano Concerto for the Left Hand)

[zondebok]

Just unbelievable music...never get tired of listening to it. So many favourite parts, e.g. how the start of the fourth movement emerges from the night of the third like a fresh spring morning

[robertcohn]

Magnificent performance by Menuhin, Cassadó and Kentner. The sound quality is a little thin, but that lends to the charm of the recording, giving it a nostalgic quality.

[asleandere]

I've collated and heard hundreds of piano trios many of which I marvel at for many different reasons: it is a joy to discover new works new, performances in this genre. No matter how far I roam, I always return to the common ground: Brahms Piano Trio No 1 in B, Shostakovich Piano Trio No 2 and then, finally this work, this performance, as if it is the very center, somehow.

[pedroa.cantero]

Limpia y magistral interpretación de este trío de Ravel, significativo y conmovedor, tanto por lo que expresa como por lo que calla. Escrito en 1914, iniciada la Gran Guerra, el autor lo concibe como faena póstuma, sabiéndose voluntario a los 39 años para ese estrago que acabaría con buena parte de la juventud europea. ¡Cosas de la vida!, necesitaría ese empuje para acabar la obra que tantos años le costara. Ravel reservaría sentimientos contrapuestos a esta pieza ajustada con premura y precisión cuando ya sonaban los cañones en la Marne. Deudor de sus maestros, no por eso deja de mostrarse inventivo. Gracias a esa reminiscencias de un canto vasco que obsesivo se apropia de ritmo y melodía, la primera parte es sin duda alguna memorable.
Bajo la forma de un Scherzo chispeante, Ravel intercala la estructura de un poema malasio –el segundo y cuarto verso de cada cuarteto relanzan el primero y tercero del siguiente a modo de un tejido– como lo hicieran Hugo y Baudelaire. ¡Ruptura exótica y liberadora! No hay mejor modo de volver que alejarse. La tierra natal pervive entonces y no cesa de resurgir cambiante y renovada.
En la voluntad de enraizarse en su otra vertiente tan francesa, Ravel engarza un pasacalle al modo de una ronda sobre la que incansable voltea hasta la desmesura. «D’une grande tension dramatique, la Passacaille […] exposé à la main gauche du piano, est un long ruban mystérieux de huit mesures que reprennent le violoncelle et le violon. Fidèle à Louis et à François Couperin, qui construisaient leurs passacailles et leurs chaconnes en rondeau plutôt que sur une basse rigoureusement obstinée, Ravel crée une riche ambiance harmonique sur laquelle évolue un lent et poignant crescendo qui s’évanouit peu à peu pour céder la place au dépouillement du thème initial»[1].
Culmina el trio con el arrebato final. Ebrio ya de ritmo y exaltación, alcanza una simbiosis excepcional de los tres instrumentos. Como sostiene Irène Brisson: « Le Finale, d’une grande virtuosité, se ressent de l’écriture orchestrale de Ravel. C’est une sorte de bacchanale qui ramène le rythme à cinq temps (3+2) de la danse basque et qui se nourrit des accords du premier mouvement, de la vivacité du Pantoum et des harmonies de la Passacaille. […] Rarement est-on parvenu à une telle symbiose entre les trois instruments, ce qui en fait un des plus beaux trios du XXe siècle »[2].

[1] Irène Brisson, Triple Forte, ATMA Classique, 2010
[2] Irène Brisson, Triple Forte, ATMA Classique, 2010

[pianiste]

ce thème initial me trotte en tête toute la journée depuis des années, c'est tellement beau !

[devarita]

Ravel! <3 Such glorious harmonies and melodies. So beautifully played, so compelling.

[ThatOneGuyRAR]

That finale is one of the coolest things ever done with 3 instruments