Home listening - Tchaikovsky, Babajanian and Debussy

The Guardian 0

An outstanding disc of piano trios from Gluzman, Moser and Sudbin, a world premiere Debussy recording from the Hallé, and Steve Reich at MoMA

• Tchaikovsky disapproved of the piano trio, describing the combination of violin, cello and piano as “unnatural” in a letter to his patron, Nadezhda von Meck, in 1881. Yet a year later he chose the form as the best way to pay tribute to his mentor, the pianist and conductor Nikolai Rubinstein. Tchaikovsky’s Piano Trio in A minor “in memory of a great artist” is the centrepiece of a new recording of Tchaikovsky & Babajanian Piano Trios (BIS) from the starry lineup of violinist Vadim Gluzman, cellist Johannes Moser and pianist Yevgeny Sudbin.