Radiant Russian memorials and unforgettable playing

Arensky • Shostakovich

Arensky: Piano Trio No. 1;

Shostakovich: Piano Trios Nos 1 & 2

Trio Con Brio Copenhagen

Orchid Classics ORC100181 69:50 mins

Ghosts haunt all three piano trios in and celebrating a star-crossed teenage love with Tatyana Glivenko. What connects this, the Arensky C minor Trio and the masterpiece Shostakovich composed just over two decades after his first essay in the format, is the winged delivery of the Korean sisters Soo-Jin (violin) and Soo-Kyung Hong (cello) with the latter’s husband, Danish pianist Jens Elvekjaer. The later Shostakovich trio isn’t the usual hard-hitter, at least until we come to the holocaust of Jewish themes at the finale’s heart; the scherzo is fast and light, though with sudden shocks from the swelling grimaces, and in both outer movements the astonishing sophistication of these players registers in split-second drop-backs to . The rich