It’s not only fast-living rockers who die in their prime.
When he died in 1828, Franz Schubert was only 31 years old.
In the history of music, only the deaths of the Belgian composer
Guillaume Lekeu (at 24) and French composer Lili Boulanger (at
25) were more tragically premature, but Lekeu and Boulanger were
in the early stages of their careers. Schubert, on the other
hand, was a full-fledged genius.
Only the death of Mozart at age 35 posed as large a tragedy
for music lovers, who continue to ruminate on just how many more
dozens of masterpieces both Schubert and Mozart would have composed
had they lived to the ripe old age of even, say, Beethoven (who
was 57 when he died).
Schubert wrote prolifically in every genre: in addition to his
hundreds of sublime songs, he wrote symphonies, stage works,
operas and some of the greatest chamber music ever known. In
what’s actually an unwelcome coincidence, two Brooklyn ensembles
are playing programs that each feature one of Schubert’s most
memorable chamber works – unwelcome because going to one concert
forces you to miss the other.
At 2 pm, Sunday, at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, the St. Luke’s
Chamber Ensemble concludes its concert with a performance of
Schubert’s towering String Quartet. And, at 3 pm, at the Lafayette
Avenue Presbyterian Church, the Brooklyn Friends of Chamber Music
present the Trio Valante (violinist Lisa Shihoten, cellist Patrick
Jee and pianist Tanya Bannister) in a recital that opens with
Schubert’s delectable Piano Trio No. 1.
(There is a way to hear both recitals: the St. Luke’s concert
is repeated Wednesday, March 20 at Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital
Hall in Manhattan. But don’t tell anyone I told you.)
The St. Luke’s program also begins with Schubert: flutist Elizabeth
Mann and pianist Margaret Kampmeier perform his "Introduction,
Theme and Variations on ’Trockne Blumen’," one of the lieder
from his song-cycle "Die Schone Mullerin." Schubert’s
lone piano-flute work is remarkably concise and reasonably complex,
considering its relative brevity.
Then, following a performance of Maurice Ravel’s exotic "Chansons
madecasses" (Songs of Madagascar) by Mann, Kampmeier, cellist
Daire FitzGerald and baritone Kurt Ollmann, FitzGerald returns
with violinists Mayuki Fukuhara and Naoko Tanaka, violist Louise
Schulman and cellist Sadao Harada for the String Quintet.
Finished mere months before his death, Schubert’s only String
Quintet is positively drenched with melancholy and a pervading
sense of impending mortality for most of its 60-minute length;
since it wasn’t even played publicly until 1850, there’s no way
that Schubert ever heard the work performed, adding another tragic
layer to this one-of-a-kind, epic chamber composition.
Brooklyn Friends
In a wide-ranging Brooklyn Friends of Chamber Music program,
the Trio Valante plays – in addition to the Schubert Trio – the
Piano Trio by Brooklyn-born composer Ezra Laderman and Johannes
Brahms’ Piano Trio, op. 87. Both the Brahms and the Laderman
Piano Trios are natural successors to Schubert’s lovely Piano
Trios, both of which were among the first to really explore the
simultaneous harmony and dichotomy of the three instruments in
their four extended movements.
Schubert’s Piano Trio No. 1 (Op. 99) showcases the composer’s
singular genius for melody and exposition. Right from introducing
the first of two major themes in the first movement, Schubert
spins an irresistible, forceful melodic sweep that keeps returning,
but always with a slight, tuneful difference. He keeps this up
throughout the first movement, then proceeds to explore the interplay
among the instruments in the following andante, scherzo and rondo
movements.
For this listener, Schubert’s last chamber works – the final
String Quartet (No. 14), the last three piano sonatas, the two
Piano Trios and the String Quintet – are among the greatest and
grandest ever written. It seems rather cruel that a music lover
must choose between the two concerts, but even hearing one Schubert
work performed live is something that should not be passed up.
The St Luke’s Chamber Ensemble will
perform Schubert and Ravel at the Brooklyn Museum of Art (200
Eastern Parkway) at 2 pm on March 17. Tickets are $25. For more
information, call info (212) 594-6100 or visit www.orchestraofstlukes.org.
Brooklyn Friends of Chamber Music presents Trio Valante performing
Schubert, Laderman and Brahms at the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian
Church, 85 South Oxford St. at Lafayette Avenue, at 3 pm on March
17. Tickets are $15, $5 students. For more information, call
(718) 855-3053.
