This program documents almost four decades of Ernst Toch’s artistic development. His romantic First Violin Sonata marks the end of the composer’s early period. The Divertimento and Cello Sonata were written during his most productive period, the 1920s, while the String Trio is the work of an exile determined not to compromise a style declared ‘asphalt music’ by the Nazis. The Adagio elegiaco commemorates the many relatives and friends Toch lost to the Holocaust.