Here are some excerpts from the recent concert in California:

MERCI BEAUCOUP, GRAMERCY

Beethoven’s massive “Archduke” Trio in B Flat, Op. 97…. powerful thematic projection and trenchant sound…. provocative and convincing.


Gunther Schuller’s Third Piano Trio opened the second half and the sinewy sonics continued in the three-movement work from 2012. Commissioned by the Gramercy, the composer’s complicated rhythmic structure struggles in the opening Tempo Moderato to be heard through an array of string slides and insistent outbursts and low-bass resister rumblings from the piano. Ms. Leventhal played tremolos at the top of her violin’s range that were captivating. She continued these acrobatics in the Largo with a long double-stopped solo passage in the mid range, with the cello playing in a mournful duet, many octaves apart. 



Tremolos in all three instruments began the final movement Presto, then in syncopating rhythms, slipping into a pulsating and languorous tango style. The violin and piano lines interwove with a controlled frenzy which ended abruptly in a loud single bottom “a” note in the piano. 

One felt this daring work could not be played better, or with more visceral impact. 



Could the high-voltage playing continue? It did indeed with a full-throttle reading of the wonderful Ravel Trio…. This was an irresistible Ravel performance, the three musicians completely at ease with their energetic conception.



– Terry McNeill, Classical Sonoma

On January 14, we premiered Gunther Schuller’s Piano Trio No. 3 at Boston’s Jordan Hall to a large and enthusiastic audience. The review in The Boston Globe begins:

“A quick stab of a chord, then a dark, slowly spreading pool of dissonance: The opening motive of Gunther Schuller’s new Piano Trio No. 3, premiered on Monday in Jordan Hall by the Gramercy Trio (violinist Sharan Leventhal, cellist Jonathan Miller, and pianist Randall Hodgkinson). At the age of 87, Schuller has written a piece that feels retro and youthful at the same time, working venerable veins of modernism with often bristling energy.”

We have exciting news. Gramercy is a recipient of a 2011 Chamber Music America Commissioning Grant. We will be getting a new trio from Gunther Schuller. This is such an exciting prospect. Working with Gunther is always a learning experience on the highest order, and his music is terrific. I recently heard the premier of his second tuba concerto – a powerful and beautiful work.

I also want to use the new piece as the starting point for our next big interdisciplinary project, As Far as the Eye Can Hear and the Ear Can See. Gunther’s music is perfect for this – having an almost physical presence in such an ephemeral medium…. It doesn’t seem an accident that his first big success as a composer was the Seven Studies on Themes of Paul Klee. I think we should try to get a sculptor involved….

-Sharan