Juilliard Chamber Music: Beethoven and Schumann

Toward the end of each semester at Juilliard, the school stages every Sunday two or three chamber music recitals back to back at Morse Hall.  This past Sunday, I went to one that featured the music of Beethoven and Schumann.

The recital began with Beethoven's Trio for Piano, Clarinet and Cello in E-flat major, Op. 38.  (The program notes listed this work as Op. 28, but that is incorrect.  The Op. 28 is the composer's Piano Sonata No. 15 in D major.)  The trio is actually an arrangement of perhaps the best known work from Beethoven's early period, the Septet in E-flat major, Op. 20 (1800).  The present reduction was done by Beethoven himself and published in 1805 (the clarinet part can be replaced by a violin depending on which instruments are available).  As cellist Hélène Werner pointed out before beginning the work, it was customary in the nineteenth century for popular works to be arranged for a smaller number of instruments so that they could be performed at home or in a salon setting.  The six-movement Septet is really a form of serenade; it's based loosely on Mozart's Divertimento in E flat major, K. 563 but, at least in my opinion, never rises to the heights of genius of that earlier work.  The Septet nevertheless is an extremely accomplished chamber piece and proved so popular during the composer's lifetime that in later years Beethoven wanted nothing to do with it.  After all, it must have been extremely frustrating for him when producing the transcendent chamber pieces of his late period to have audiences clamoring instead for a performance of this youthful work.  As far as the present reduction is concerned, it is excellent as far as it goes, but the sound is comparatively spare and I would much have preferred to have heard the original version with all seven instruments.  The other two performers at this recital were Noemi Sallai, clarinet, and Mariel Werner, piano; the ensemble was coached by Jon Manasse.

The second and final work on the program was Schumann's Piano Quartet in E-flat major, Op. 47 (1842).  During his career, Schumann typically immersed himself in composing works for a particular genre before moving on to the next.  1842 was no exception; it was the year in which Schumann wrote many of his most important chamber works.  Aside from the instant quartet, these included the great Piano Quintet, Op. 44, also in E-flat major, as well as the three string quartets that comprise the Op. 41, Schumann's only works in this format, and the Fantasiestücke for piano trio published posthumously in 1887 as Op. 88.  The Quartet was completed immediately after the Quintet and it may have been that Schumann was attempting to further develop the musical ideas he had conceived in the earlier work.  The four movement Quartet is a bit more traditional than the Quintet and the final movement an exercise in counterpoint, but the heart of the work is the andante, placed somewhat unusually as the third movement following the scherzo.  It is so filled with yearning that one is reminded irresistibly of Schubert's great chamber works, particularly the piano trios.  Certainly, in listening to this piece one can better understand the influence that Schubert had on the Romantics who followed him.  The musicians at this performance were Kenneth McDonald, violin; Hannah Geisinger, viola; Noah Koh, cello; Hechengzi Li, piano; they were coached Natasha Brofsky and Matti Raekallio.