Schubert: Piano Trio No. 2 / Notturno

Description

Franz Schubert (1797-1828) Piano Trio No. 2 in E flat major, Op. 100, D. 929 Sonatensatz in B flat major, D. 28   Franz Schubert was born in 1797, the son of a Vienna schoolmaster, and had his education, as a chorister of the Imperial Chapel, at the Stadtkonvikt. Both at school and at home he had an active musical life as a player and as a composer, and when his voice broke and he was offered the means to continue his academic education, he decided, instead, to train as a teacher, thus being able to devote more time to music. By the age of eighteen he had joined his father in the schoolroom, while continuing to compose and to study with the old Court Kapellmeister Antonio Salieri. In 1816 he moved away from home, lodging with his new friend, Franz von Schober, thus released for the moment from the drudgery of teaching. The following years found him generally in the company of friends, with an occasional return to the schoolroom, when necessity dictated, showing there no great talent or interest in his task. Schubert's brief career continued in Vienna and while there were occasional commissions and some of his works were published, there was never the opportunity for the kind of distinguished patronage that Beethoven had had and still enjoyed, nor the possibility of an official position in the musical establishment of the city. It was March 1828 before Schubert was able to take the risk of a concert devoted to his work, an event that proved both successful and profitable, but by the autumn his health had weakened, the consequence of a venereal infection contracted six years earlier. He died on 19th November. The Piano Trio No. 2 in E flat major, D. 929, with Piano Trio No.1 in B flat major, D. 898, and the posthumously published Notturno, D. 897, were probably written late in 1827. It has been suggested that the Notturno, a single Adagio movement, was originally intended as the slow movement of Piano Trio No. 1, and the dating of the paper used supports this view. The second of the two completed piano trios, a work for which Schumann expressed a general preference over the first of the two, finding it more spirited, masculine and dramatic in tone, was first performed at a private party in January 1828 to celebrate the engagement of Schubert's school-friend Josef von Spaun and formed part of the public concert of Schubert's music in March. It was given its first private performance by the pianist Karl Maria von Bocklet, with the violinist Ignaz Schuppanzigh and the cellist Josef Linke. At the public concert in March Schuppanzigh, who was indisposed, was replaced by the violinist, Josef Bohm. The trio was published by Probst in Leipzig, the first of Schubert's compositions to attract the attention of a foreign publisher, in October 1828. For the published version Schubert cut 99 bars from the last movement. These are retained in the present recording. The first movement starts with an immediate call to our attention and a first subject of