Sitkovetsky Trio - Felix Mendelssohn: The Piano Trios (2015)

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Sitkovetsky Trio - Felix Mendelssohn: The Piano Trios (2015)

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One of Mendelssohn’s own watercolours of the Amalfi coast is on the cover of the Sitkovetsky Trio’s recording, all honeyed village walls and turquoise sea; a similar sense of heat and spaciousness comes across in their performance of his two piano trios. In Trio No 2, the piano dominates, which gives the impression that violinist Alexander Sitkovetsky is pushing his tone more than is ideal. But in the tiny third movement, Wu Qian rattles off the piano part with a deft, light touch, and the violin and cello have room to be as crisply quiet as they like. In this and the corresponding movement of Trio No 1, this recording scores marginally in Mendelssohnian lightness against the strong recent release from the Trio Dali. The slow movement of No 1 is full of long phrases and sweet violin tone, and the finale rounds things off with a fine balance of breadth and playfulness.

Review by Erica Jeal, The Guardian

What a pleasure to have not one but two recordings of the Mendelssohn piano trios plunk on to my doormat. The Trio Dali offer a bonus in the form of two Bach chorale arrangements, for violin and cello respectively, sensitively played, with minimum vibrato.

Both sets of players are alive to the unease of the opening movement of the D minor Trio, with some particularly refulgent duetting between Alexander Sitkovetsky and Leonard Elsenbroich (4'01"), compared to which the string players of the Dali are a touch more held back. Few, though, can rival Heifetz and Piatigorsky in this regard. In the Andante, which is such a minefield if taken too slowly, both pianists set up a good tempo, with an apt balance between eloquence and simplicity, though later on it’s Elsenbroich’s tone which is the more alluring. But sample the Fischer/Müller-Schott/Gilad line-up and you find an even greater intensity at the climax. If no one quite rivals Argerich and the Capuçon brothers for sheer pizzazz in the scherzo, the Sitkovetszky nevertheless set off at a tremendous pace, though perhaps they don’t quite convey the insouciant élan of Fischer et al. In the finale, it’s the Sitkovetsky whom I prefer, the Dali seeming a touch desiccated sound-wise (though this is not helped by the recording, which is less immediate than BIS’s for the Sitkovetsky Trio).

Again, comparing the two groups in the C minor Trio, what’s striking is the less flattering recording of the Dali. If neither quite matches the Fischer reading in transparency of piano figuration or dramatic use of dynamics in the first movement, it’s the Sitkovetsky who are the more persuasive of the two new versions. They’re a touch broader in the hymnic slow movement, though I like the Dali’s simplicity of approach; this is a movement that prompts widely diverging views, Fischer opting for a tempo so slow that it would seem sepulchral were it not for the intensity of the playing, compared to which Heifetz et al positively zip through it. Again, the Sitkovetsky are a shade faster than the Dali in the scherzo, though both dispatch it with great spirit, and they are also particularly compelling in the finale, with a palpable sense of elation at the switch to the major in the closing minutes. So, two fine new recordings, though the Sitkovetsky are a degree more telling, and better recorded.

Review by Harriet Smith, Gramophone

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Sitkovetsky Trio - Felix Mendelssohn: The Piano Trios (2015)

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Sitkovetsky Trio - Felix Mendelssohn: The Piano Trios (2015)

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Sitkovetsky Trio - Felix Mendelssohn: The Piano Trios (2015)

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