Haydn Piano Trio No. 24 in D Major (1795), Shostakovich Piano Trio No. 1 in C minor, Op. 8 (1924) and Chaminade Piano Trio No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 11 (1881)
Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) was an Austrian composer of the Classical period. He was instrumental in the development of chamber music such as the string quartet and piano trio. His contributions to musical form have led him to be called “Father of the Symphony” and “Father of the String Quartet”. Haydn spent much of his career as a court musician for the wealthy Esterházy family at their Eszterháza Castle. Until the later part of his life, this isolated him from other composers and trends in music so that he was, as he put it, “forced to become original”. Yet his music circulated widely, and for much of his career he was the most celebrated composer in Europe. He was a friend and mentor of Mozart and a tutor of Beethoven.
Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975) was a Soviet-era Russian composer and pianist. He is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century and one of its most popular composers. His music is characterized by sharp contrasts, elements of the grotesque, and ambivalent tonality; he was also heavily influenced by the neoclassical style pioneered by Igor Stravinsky, and by the late Romanticism of Gustav Mahler.
Cécile Louise Stéphanie Chaminade (1857-1944) was a French composer and pianist. In 1913, she was awarded the Légion d’Honneur, a first for a female composer. Ambroise Thomas said, “This is not a woman who composes, but a composer who is a woman.” Chaminade affiliated herself with nationalist composers such as Camille Saint-Saëns and Charles Gounod. Her musical style was rooted in both Romantic and French tradition throughout her career and her music has been described as tuneful, highly accessible and mildly chromatic. In describing her own style, Chaminade wrote, “I am essentially of the Romantic school, as all my work shows.”
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