MUSIC REVIEWS : Revitalized Beaux Arts Trio at Ambassador

Too often during the latter half of its nearly 40 years of existence, the Beaux Arts Trio could coast on the undiminished enthusiasm and talents of its pianist, Menahem Pressler, while his jaded colleagues were giving the impression of being engaged elsewhere, phoning in their parts, as the saying goes.

The arrival six years ago of cellist Peter Wiley signaled the start of a revival. And now that there is a new violinist as well, the redoubtable Ida Kavafian, Pressler returns to his rightful position, as part of a vital, perfectly matched ensemble rather than star by default.

With its present membership, the Beaux Arts again represents the gold standard for piano trios, as they demonstrated before what looked like a full house at Ambassador Auditorium on Wednesday.

Without stooping to didacticism, the artists presented a master class in the art of musical communication: with each other and with their appreciative audience.

Opening with Beethoven’s Trio in G, Opus 1, No. 2, is a daring move. It’s a long piece, moreover one that begins with an extended stretch of what in less comprehending hands might seem an almost impossibly convoluted exercise in harmonic noodling.

The Beaux Arts members patiently unraveled every oddly colored, fascinating thread, building to a coherent whole, with a quite astonishing range of soft dynamics, before allowing the fast main theme to kick in with tremendous vigor.

The sentimental charms of Anton Arensky’s Tchaikovsky-inspired Trio in D minor were treated no less seriously as regards textural clarification, but with a richer ensemble sonority and with a feeling of cutting loose any emotional restraints, particularly in the scherzo’s rollicking trio.

Felix Mendelssohn’s familiar Opus 49 Trio, in D minor (a more Classical and refined D minor than Arensky’s), sang, roared and sighed--with grace, energy, flawless balances and not a trace of affectation.