Felici Trio celebrates fall with ‘Autumn Hues’ weekend concerts

New Chamber Music Unbound season begins this weekend

Joseph Haydn, Maurice Ravel and Anton Arensky are the three composers featured on the Felici Piano Trio’s concerts this weekend, entitled “Autumn Hues.” The performances take place in Mammoth Lakes this Saturday, 7 p.m., at Cerro Coso Community College and at Bishop’s Cerro Coso campus on Sunday afternoon at 4 p.m. They mark the beginning of Chamber Music Unbound’s 2022-23 winter concert series, the Felici Trio’s 25th season in the Eastern Sierra!

The three colorful works on the program represent three distinctive style periods of music: the Austrian Joseph Haydn, who is credited with having “invented” the piano trio genre represents the Classical period (after which Classical music is somewhat falsely named), Anton Arensky (a great admirer of Tchaikovsky) is a Romantic composer of Russian heritage, and Maurice Ravel’s music is closely related to the French Impressionist style of painting that revolutionized the art world in the late 19th and early

20th century. Each composer is unique in the way he writes for the combination of piano, violin and cello, and hearing their works side-by-side allows one to appreciate the depth of the artists’ individual creativity and the wide palette of sounds a trio can produce.

Naturally, the composers’ personal lives are hardly separated from their musical work, and it is illuminating to ponder how their vastly different experiences might have contributed to it. Haydn (1732-1809) was the second of twelve children of a wheelwright and grew up in a very modest home. His mother was a well-organized and industrious woman who required the same qualities of her children, and his father was a great music lover, who played the harp and sang and encouraged all his children to “chime in” with him in informal family concerts. Joseph began his professional career in utter poverty, but through sheer grit and determination eked out a living as a young composer. By midlife, he had become widely-known and beloved across Europe, for his music is supremely cheerful and optimistic, without ever being trite.

Anton Arensky (18611906), was the son of a doctor who was a fine amateur cellist. His mother, who was an excellent pianist, became Anton’s first teacher. He was a prodigious child and the family moved from Novgorod to St. Petersburg to allow him to develop his composition skills under the guidance of the famous Nikolai Rimskykorsakoff. But even though he was successful as composer, pianist and conductor, Arensky suffered from addictions to alcohol and gambling and succumbed to tuberculosis at the age of 44. His piano trio is a heartfelt and moving tribute to a cellist friend and features lush textures, rich harmonies and sensuous melodies.

Maurice Ravel (18751937) was the eldest child of a Swiss engineer (credited with designing some of the very first automobiles!), who was delighted to facilitate his son’s music studies in Paris. But young Ravel turned out to be a colorful character and a bit of a revolutionary. He refused to conform to the standard curriculum at the Conservatoire and had very strong opinions and feelings regarding the ways through which he wanted to express himself musically.

Ultimately that won him lasting success and fame, but it was a rocky road of his own making the young man had to travel… Ravel’s music is characterized by playfulness and an animated dialogue between the instruments. It is rhythmically intricate and harmonically adventurous, yet also deeply expressive and evocative.

To enjoy these great musical artworks, come hear them performed live by the dedicated musicians of the Felici Piano Trio this weekend! Tickets are available at the door or online at Chambermusicunbound.org