Janine Jansen, Timothy Ridout, Pablo Ferrández & Denis Kozhukhin by Brahms, Dvořák, Ab (2024/2024), Théâtre de Valère, Sitten, Schweiz

Johannes Brahms and Antonín Dvořák were bound by mutual admiration and a deep friendship. This musical fraternity, which lasted twenty years, permeated their compositions. Chamber music thus occupies a fundamental place in their respective works. The Trio Op. 8 is an early work, composed in 1853 by a twenty-year-old Brahms. Like a mirror, it brings together the youth and maturity of a composer who would revisit the piece thirty-eight years later, “just to give it a comb-over, to untangle its hair”. While retaining the youthful impulse evident in the fourth movement – Allegro –, Brahms reworked his text, rewriting entire sections and modifying certain themes. We then travel with emotion through all the tenderness of a man looking back to his younger years. Dvořák composed his Piano Quartet Op. 87 at the request of the German publisher Simrock, noting the success of Brahms’s! Sketched out in three days, this quartet’s original, inventive writing showcases the viola, the composer’s favourite instrument. A frenzied finale inspired by Gypsy folk dances concludes this rich and powerful quartet. Two emblematic works from the chamber music repertoire in a concert not to be missed!