Shostakovich: Piano Trios & Songs

'One might be forgiven for wondering whether the market for this particular repertory has already reached saturation point. Fortunately such concerns are tempered when considering the Florestan Trio's hugely impressive track record and their unwavering capacity to shed new light on familiar repertory … The Florestans fully capture the youthful adour and impetuosity of the First Trio. They are in equally inspired form in the Seven Blok Romances providing mesmerising and powerfully etched accompaniments to Susan Gritton's achingly beautiful singing' --BBC Music Magazine

'This isn't the first CD to group Shostakovich's two piano trios with his late Romances to poems by Alexander Blok but, for the freshness and excellence in every aspect of performance and production, it would be my pick' --Gramophone

'A recording to cherish then from a trio of musicians who, from one recording to the next have always played to the highest standards' --Classical Music Sentinel

'The Florestan Trio performs with terrific presence, precision, immediacy and palpable atmosphere. They delve beneath the surface to find and project the nuances of expression that lend these works their special flavour of soul searching. Even the First Trio – a work dedicated to one of Shostakovich’s loves, Tatyana Glivenko – seems to inhabit a world coloured more by nostalgia and anxiety than out-and-out ardour. In the Second Trio these feelings are intensified even further' --The Telegraph

MP3 320 · 134 MB