La Mer: French Piano Trios

The Neave Trio's new album celebrates French works for piano trio, focussing on three works composed around the turn of the twentieth century. Saint-Saëns's Piano Trio no.2 dates from 1892 and comprises five movements. Unusually for Saint-Saëns, the work took a great deal of time from conception to completion (over five years) and then went through a number of revisions before Saint-Saëns was finally satisfied. Mel Bonis's two pieces Soir and Matin, whilst on a smaller scale, are equally powerful works, bridging the worlds of romanticism and impressionism. The first piece is dominated by a cantabile melody, whilst Matin is more chromatic and harmonically complex. The album concludes with Sally Beamish's arrangement of Debussy's orchestral masterpiece La Mer. This three-movement symphonic work presented Beamish with an exceptional challenge, as she strove to 'reinvent Debussy's orchestral score with the piano trio in mind... This meant exploring what strings and piano can do in terms of texture, and concentrating on idiomatic and natural techniques.' By studying and recreating Debussy's colours and textures, rather than attempting to transcribe every note, Beamish produced an arrangement that presents the performers and listeners with a completely new perspective on these well-loved seascapes.