Home listening - Brahms for all seasons

The Guardian 0

The composer’s horn trio paired with Ligeti, Garrick Ohlsson’s riveting account of the late piano works and Radio 3 essays revisited

• Brahms’s father was a horn player. The composer himself played the piano and, to a lesser extent, the violin. His understanding of all three instruments – an odd combination which he pioneered – gives a special eloquence to the Horn Trio in E flat, written in 1865 when Brahms was 32 years old. Horns with valves were in use, but he opted, here, for the “natural” horn, with its more limited range and raw, melancholy timbre. André Cazalet (horn), Guy Comentale (violin) and Cyril Huvé (piano) give an eloquent performance on Calliope, capturing both the elegiac and exuberant, hunting qualities of this work. Ligeti’s Horn Trio (1982) calls itself “Hommage à Brahms”. It pushes modern horn technique in new, challenging directions yet remains expressive, witty in the fast second movement, dark and impassioned in its slow, final lament. With so few works written for this combination, these are the best, masterpieces both.