Above : Pianist Bernadette Harvey. Featured image: Bernadette Harvey, Harry Bennetts and Miles Mullin-Chivers played works by Hollier, Beethoven, Grieg and Ravel.
This concert was the first of the Sydney leg in Musica Viva’s substantial national tour and workshop schedule. On Ravel’s birthday, it finished with a superbly colourful and scintillating version of his Piano Trio in A minor (1914).
The pathos and determined drive of this work emerged from the composer’s shock at conflict brewing in Europe. This was a timely similarity to our modern day Europe, ending the night on an especially poignant note given current news coverage of horrors in Europe.
Drama and vivid expression on the musical and extramusical plane was a feature of this programme leading to Ravel’s work. The stunningly svelte piano and string conversing here easily realised the drama and character of each composition.
Form, structure and the individual scope of each composer’s utterance were well examined throughout and easily presented with verve and clear, careful management of line
It was a thrill to begin the concert with the newly commissioned work Musica Viva always provide. This time it was A Little Sea Music (2021) by Australian Don Hollier. The short movements demand much expressive virtuosity as successive sections each explore a different accent for the watery effects and colourful conversation.
Above: Cellist Miles Mullin-Chivers
This ensemble ensured the reading of this new work was descriptive, measured and eloquent. For each movement, Hollier’s work developed textual ideas of well known poems by Alfred, Lord Tennyson as well as Kenneth Slessor, the Biblical ‘Song of Songs’and John Masefield. Special performance effects like stamping and speaking keywords were handled just as well by the group as the ensemble filigree.
It was a thrill to have the absolute classic of this genre, Beethoven’s ‘Ghost’ Piano Trio Op 70 No 1, included in the programme, appearing immediately after the new work. It served to anchor the performers’ talent in a display of traditional chamber music playing. This work compared well with the more modern manipulations of the piano trio texture and sonority surrounding in on the night.
This ensemble excelled in showing off Beethoven’s brusque unisons and the pivoting on a knife edge of bravura then beautiful lyricism and exchange. Balance was very fine here, and the piano part sat so well amidst the chats with great directness between the cello and violin. We got a superb Beethovenesque Largo statement in the second movement , followed by a bristling Presto to finish. The familiarity was welcome.
Fleshing out the programme in its centre was an excerpt only from the Violin Sonata No 2, Op 13 by Edvard Grieg. This work brought us closer to the twentieth century, and the more well-known trio work by Ravel. Grieg’s Lento movement standing alone and splintered from the full work actually served as a nice bridge between the piano trios. It was a formidable showcase for the solo and ensemble prowess of Bernadette Harvey and Harry Bennetts.
Above: Violinist Harry Bennetts played the ‘Lento doloroso’ movement from Edvard Grieg’s Violin Sonata No 2 in G major Op 13.
Grieg’s rich idiomatic writing and ability to create vivid shifting shapes demanding a myriad of nuance was in stable hands with this duo. This substantial, sprawling and layered movement featuring a set of soundscapes with various characters juxtaposed was also a perfect prelude for the concert’s meaty finale.
Ravel’s popular Piano Trio in A minor from 1914 was a poignant way to conclude this event. It’s gentle start was a nice reflection of the more tender moments from the composers in the earlier part of the programme. The playing in broad, energetic strokes it requires was also provided with excitement and confidence by these musicians.
On an extramusical plane, Ravel’s discussion about the world on the brink of war as included in the informative Musica Viva programme resonated especially with us in our current fragile world state. Reading this as I listened to the cherished, hushed and familiar opening confirmed this work as an expressive favourite. It was a true highlight of the event.
The seamless passing of development fragments and musical motifs in essential relay amongst the trio was exemplary. The creation of interesting reiterations of major contours and new colours within Ravel’s shiny architecture was fresh and impressive. The intimate genius of the dialoguing in the Pantoum movement and the trio’s firm deliberation when presenting the expansive theme in the Passacaille celebrated these instrumentalists and Ravel’s innovative creativity a la fois .
This concert took us on a significant journey backwards and forwards in time and style to share the formidable expressive possibilities of fine piano trio as well as piano and strings playing. It celebrated the progressive programmatic writing of some of the most popular composers of more modern times. Let’s hope this excellent trio performs and records together well past this current Musica Viva tour.