NORTHFIELD — A musical confluence of world-class musicians, instruments, music and venue is set for Sunday, March 20, when Ashuelot Concerts of Keene, New Hampshire, will perform the Schubert Piano Trio No. 2 at The Moody Center auditorium at Thomas Aquinas College.
British chamber musicians Louisa Stonehill and Nicholas Burns will be joined by international cellist Guy Johnson. Each is playing on particularly noteworthy instruments.
Johnson will perform on a cello made by Antonio Stradivari, a well-known violin maker. According to Burns, there are only 65 cellos left that were made by Stradivari and this particular instrument was made in 1692.
Burns, who is also artistic and executive director of Ashuelot Concerts, will be playing on a 9-foot Steinway Concert Model D piano.
“It was made in Hamburg in 1964 and then completely remanufactured in 2019,” Burns explained. “It’s an absolutely stunning concert instrument that will be moved to Northfield for this concert. For me, it’s the musical equivalent of driving a Ferrari. There’s nothing that’s not possible on that instrument.
“Oddly, even though it’s so huge, it actually can play much, much quieter than a smaller instrument, and it just has a much wider range of colors and different sounds, which is why it’s so important for chamber music,” he continued. “Obviously, a violin and a cello are physically nowhere near as big as a piano, and the art of chamber music is balancing those three very different sounds together to make this whole that’s somehow much, much greater than the sum of its parts.”
Stonehill will be playing a modern instrument made in 2010 especially for her. It’s a copy of a famous violin made by Joseph Guarnerius.
“Modern makers are able to put famous instruments into MRI machines now and get their dimensions to a tenth of a millimeter,” Burns explained. “So if you find a very good violin maker, which we did, then they are able to recreate a modern version of these incredibly valuable instruments. The instrument that this is based on is called the Lord Wilson and is currently locked in a collector’s vault in San Francisco. But there are a few of these copies around and we are lucky enough to have one of those.”
The concert will run without intermission. The Schubert Piano Trio No. 2 involves roughly an hour’s worth of music, Burns said, “but it’s very, very special.”
“Schubert had a very short life. He died when he was 31 and he always liked to obsess about one thing at the time,” Burns explained. “In 1827, when Beethoven died, Schubert was very moved by his passing. The tale is that he once saw Beethoven in a tavern, but he was too shy and nervous about going up and introducing himself.
“After Beethoven’s death, Schubert wanted to pay tribute to his memory,” Burns continued. “One of the things he was most struck by was Beethoven’s piano trios, and so Schubert turned to piano trios and wrote two of them in quick succession — the B flat and the one we’ll be playing, the E flat. It’s an absolutely gigantic piece that lasts 50 minutes. It’s impossible to understand it until you’ve heard it live. You can’t believe it’s only three people playing. Something happens in the piece that it sounds like a gigantic symphony orchestra that’s playing. You can’t understand how any three instruments can come up with these extraordinary sounds.”
Additionally, as an introduction, the three will perform Edvarg Grieg’s Andante con moto for piano trio.
“Grieg was a Norwegian Romantic composer and it’s the only piece he wrote for piano trio,” Burns explained. “It lasts 10 minutes.”
The Moody Center auditorium is quite an interesting place to hear chamber music, according to Burns.
“It’s huge, but because it’s made of wood, the wood rings in sympathy with the string instruments,” he said.
The concert is set for Sunday, March 20, at 4 p.m. It is sponsored by Thomas Aquinas College with support from The Moody Center.
Tickets are available at ashuelotconcerts.org. A limited number of senior tickets are available at a two-thirds discount. To reserve a discounted ticket, call 413-498-5022. Area students may attend free of charge.