Newly formed Trio Marie Soldat releases its eagerly awaited debut album on Linn. Comprising violinist Cecilia Bernardini, fortepianist Keiko Shichijo and cellist Marcus van den...

Newly formed Trio Marie Soldat releases its eagerly awaited debut album on Linn. Comprising violinist Cecilia Bernardini, fortepianist Keiko Shichijo and cellist Marcus van den Munckhof, the Dutch trio takes its name from Marie Soldat-Roeger, a pupil of Joseph Joachim and celebrated violinist who formed perhaps the first all-women chamber group in 1887 known as the Soldat Quartet. The program includes two E flat major masterpieces of the genre, fittingly performed on period instruments. Mellow in tone and richly textured, Beethoven’s Op. 70 No. 2 belongs to the composer’s so-called ‘middle period’. Composed in 1808 at the end of a particularly creative phase which saw a flurry of expansive works, the trio looks back at Beethoven’s one-time teacher Haydn. Trio Marie Soldat rounds off its recital with an enticing account of what is perhaps the pinnacle of the trio repertoire, Schubert’s Piano Trio No. 2. Although later revised by the composer himself, the Trio gives a rare chance to hear the longer, seldom performed premiere edition.