Thursday, 11 February 1999
Eroica brings a joyous piano trio sound
Cellist Sara Sant'Ambrogio, pianist Erika Nickrenz and violinist Adela Peña shined brightest on a Brazilian work.

By Ken Keuffel Jr.
The Arizona Daily Star


String quartets have dominated this season's Arizona Friends of Chamber Music concerts. But last night, the Eroica Trio's striking - and talented - musicians made a strong case for the piano trio as well.

Violinist Adela Peña, cellist Sara Sant'Ambrogio and pianist Erika Nickrenz did it, first off, by doing a bang-up job on a stellar new work, commissioned by the Friends: Piano Trio, by Raimundo Penaforte, a Brazilian composer based in New York.

Penaforte, also a violinist and arranger, is one of Brazil's most prolific composers, according to program notes. (He's also one of the best, believe me.) His works have been performed all over and for many different projects, including a United Nations documentary film.

He and the Eroica enjoy a fruitful relationship: Already, the ensemble has recorded his jazzy and colorful arrangements of Gershwin's Three Preludes.

The Piano Trio deserves similar treatment. In it, the composer shows an uncanny knack for making various mutations of jazz, tango and Brazilian idioms work within the piano trio framework.

Each of the three movements was inspired by and named after the first name of a different composer. Serious fun never sounded so good.

The first movement, ``Astor'' (as in Astor Piazzola), alternates the subdued melancholy and moodiness of a jazz ballad with a rapidly moving unison line of violin and cello.

The second movement, ``Maurice'' (as in Maurice Ravel), was inspired by the passacaglia movement in Ravel's Piano Trio. Sant'Ambrogio's basso ostinato (part plucking and strumming) set the stage for some rowdy jazz-flavored interjections by the other players.

The third movement, ``Capiba,'' (as in the Brazilian composer), took on the joyously improvisatory qualities of the South American nation's infectious music.

Lalo's C-Minor Trio opened the program. This is an unjustly neglected example of Romanticism. Last night, each of its sprawling melodies allowed both violinist and cellist to shine.

For her part, pianist Nickrenz enhanced her string partners' success by always complementing - and never overpowering - them.

Parts of pianist Edward Steuermann's arrangement of Schoenberg's ``Verklärte Nacht,'' which concluded the program, seemed excessive and overblown. But the Eroica took the listener on a sensitively guided odyssey that grew on you bit by bit.

As for their widely noted glamour, the 30-something Eroica players each looked stunning in different-colored evening gowns. (Blue, green and orange were represented.)

But mark these words: If people stop looking - and that's not about to happen anytime soon - they certainly won't stop listening.