Only Strings

Pianist Patil Harboyan is a scholar of Armenian music. Due in part to her urging, Trio de l’Île incorporates the work of two Armenian composers on this lovely disc, including that of St Petersburg Conservatory-trained Gayané Chebotaryan (d. 1998). Her one-movement Trio (1945) combines elements of Armenian folk music and the Russian classical tradition. To my ears, its lyricism suggests Dvorak and Mendelssohn, and its rolling forward motion movement Chopin.

Soviet-Armenian composer Arno Babadjanian (d. 1983) composed his trio in F sharp minor in 1952. As in the Chebotaryan, we taste bittersweet strains of folk music, along with hints of Shostakovich and Borodin, Debussy and Ravel.

Many credit Argentine composer Astor Piazzolla (d. 1992) with creating the “Nuevo Tango,” a fusion of tango, popular song, and traditional classical forms. He composed his popular Las Cuatro Estaciones Porteñas for quintet; it since has been rearranged for several combinations of instruments. The challenge for the trio here is to suggest the timbres of violin, piano, electric guitar, double bass and bandeon. I appreciate their success, and the perfect intonation of violin and cello, the joyful glissandi, the execution of intense dynamic changes, and of Piazzola’s humorous sound-painting of weather patterns.

This recording bodes well for the Trio and represents yet another first-rate release from Divine Art.

—Paul Baker