Saint-Saens: Piano Trios Nos 1 & 2

Saint-Saens: Piano Trios Nos 1 & 2 cover $30.00 Out of Stock
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CAMILLE SAINT-SAENS
Saint-Saens: Piano Trios Nos 1 & 2
Florestan Trio

[ Hyperion / CD ]

Release Date: Monday 1 May 2006

This item is currently out of stock. It may take 6 or more weeks to obtain from when you place your order as this is a specialist product.

"The fabulous Florestan find thrills and refinement for a Saint-Saëns stunner. This marvellous trio have that effect on their fans. Their restrained, delicate playing always leads to a cleverly calculated but deeply felt emotional pay-off."
Editor's Choice - Gramophone Magazine (May 2006)

"The fabulous Florestan find thrills and refinement for a Saint-Saëns stunner. This marvellous trio have that effect on their fans. Their restrained, delicate playing always leads to a cleverly calculated but deeply felt emotional pay-off. It had our critic in tears, and he promises faithfully he's not on commission." Editor's Choice - Gramophone Magazine (May 2006)

Despite being the composer of innumerable works in all genres from grand opera to piano miniature, Saint-Saëns today is known largely for his third symphony (the 'Organ' Symphony), the piano concertos (award-winningly recorded by Stephen Hough on Hyperion) and the omnipresent Carnival of the animals (a work its composer did his best to suppress). The two piano trios, composed in 1863 and 1892, stand at the apogee of his neglected chamber music output, and their place in a genre the composer held dear is reflected in their quality.

Piano Trio No 1 was Saint-Saëns's first truly successful work. Inspired by the terrain and folk music of the French Pyrenees, it has a breezy simplicity, its open lyricism-naïveté even-offering so much more than 1860s opera-mad France could ever have realized. The second trio is a more serious and subtle work; the intervening decades had seen Saint-Saëns retreat from a world in which he felt increasing marginalized. From self-imposed exile in Algeria he sent this work to the world as a postcard firmly reiterating his belief in the values of traditional form and melody.

Performances by The Florestan Trio are every bit as committed and polished as we have come to expect from their many previous acclaimed recordings.

Tracks:

Piano Trio No 1 in F major Op 18
Piano Trio No 2 in E minor Op 92