Peabody Piano Trio Comes Out Strong Despite Injury

Pianists are human, too, subject to frailties and injuries, so it was hard to balk at the news of a program change for the Peabody Piano Trio, Monday night at Pierce College. A hand injury caused pianist Seth Knopp to heed caution and reconsider the original program. Out went Dvorak’s “Dumky” trio and Schumann’s pianistic showpiece, the “Fantasiestucke” in A minor.

But adversity yielded to opportunity, and the audience got to bask in the rare pleasure of hearing Ravel’s Sonata for Violin and Cello, played with focused intensity by violinist Violaine Melancon and cellist Thomas Kraines. The work, with its kinetic energy sometimes verging on obsessiveness and its rhythmic and rhetorical devices presaging minimalism, emerged as it should--as a restless dance and dialogue between voices.

The concert opened with another substitution, the softly gleaming Haydn Trio in E minor. Here, the trio showed the skill and cohesion built up over its dozen years of experience.

In whatever combination it appears, this is a tight ensemble, holding fast while also conveying an impressive collective emotionality. Emotion ran high in Beethoven’s Trio in E-flat, Opus 70, No. 2, on the instruments and beyond, with audible heavy breaths punctuating the arcs of phrases and Knopp’s left foot rubbing the floor and suggesting the sound of brushes on a snare drum.

Injury or not, Knopp showed himself a fine, expressive player, boasting both polish or passion. Ditto the trio as a whole.

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* The Peabody Trio performs the same program tonight at 8, Wilshire-Ebell Theatre, 4401 E. 8th St. $7-$22. (310) 552-3030.