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The Gould Piano Trio

Date
Date
Friday 14 October 2022, 1:05pm - 1:55pm
Admission
Free - no booking required
Doors
Open from 12:30pm
Lucy Gould (violin) Richard Lester (cello) Benjamin Frith (piano)
Ludwig van Beethoven - Trio in B flat, Woo 39
John Casken - Lust of Roots
Fanny Mendelssohn - Piano Trio, op 11
The Gould Piano Trio’s programme opens with the charming one movement trio that Beethoven penned for a 10 year old pianist, Maximiliane Brentano, who lived with her grandparents in Vienna from 1809-1812. Beethoven was a frequent visitor, befriending the musical child, resulting in this miniature masterpiece.
Enjoying an ongoing artistic collaboration with John Casken, the Gould’s perform his Lust of Roots trio, inspired by Kathleen Raine’s metaphysical Northumbrian Sequence. A sleeper at the foot of a Roman tree “Dreams the darkness of the root, Dreams the flow that ascends the vein.” This relates perfectly with D.H. Lawrence’s comment, “I would like to be a tree for a while. The great lust of roots. Root-lust. And no mind at all.”
Today we have a wonderful opportunity to champion female composers and Fanny (Mendelssohn) Hensel’s D minor piano trio fully displays her great musical powers of imagination. Desiring publication of her works, Fanny had to endure opposition from her own family-the Trio becoming her op 11 only three years after her untimely death. The passionate opening Allegro con brio gives way to two more intimate central movements, but the piece ends affirmably in the major key, a beacon for those that followed.

The Gould Piano Trio
The Gould Piano Trio, directly compared to the great Beaux Arts Trio for their “musical fire” and “dedication to the genre” in the Washington Post, remain at the forefront of the international chamber music scene. Launched by their first prize at the International Melbourne Chamber Music Competition, they were “Echo Rising Stars”, making a highly successful debut at New York’s Weill Recital Hall, described by Strad Magazine as “Pure Gould.”
The Trio’s many appearances at London’s Wigmore Hall have included the complete piano trios of Dvořák, Mendelssohn and Schubert as well as, in 2017-18, a Beethoven cycle to celebrate 25 years since their debut at this iconic venue. Their belief in the importance of developing new repertoire has resulted in commissioning works from many contemporary composers including Sir James MacMillan, who added a contrasting second Piano Trio to his celebrated ‘14 Little Pictures’, and Mark Simpson, whose ‘After Avedon’ was commissioned and performed by the Gould’s for the 2017 Hull “City of Culture”, as part of the PRS “New Music Biennial”. The Trio’s commissioning of ‘Four Fables’ from Huw Watkins, with clarinettist Robert Plane, headed up the 21st Anniversary of their annual Corbridge Chamber Music Festival in 2019, subsequently being performed in collaboration with dancer, Mayouri Boonham.
International tours have been interspersed by adventurous recording projects, with particular emphasis on long neglected gems from the late romantic British repertoire. Following the release of John Casken’s 70th birthday disc, this evergreen Northumbrian composer wrote a new piano trio for the Goulds, premiered at the Buxton Festival in July 2022. The Trio have now embarked on a cycle of Schubert’s trios for Resonus Classics, following on from their American inspired disc - piano trios by Charles Ives, Rebecca Clarke and Amy Beach.

 

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