Washington Classical Review

This season of the Chamber Music at the Barns series is the first with Daniel Hope as artistic adviser, who succeeded Wu Han in that role last year. As a sort of passing of the torch, Hope joined his predecessor, along with cellist David Finckel, for a concert of piano trios Sunday afternoon in the Barns at Wolf Trap.

Designed to show the evolution of the piano trio genre, from Haydn to Beethoven to Dvořák, the three musicians performed in a sort of stylistic crescendo. In Haydn’s Piano Trio No. 32, Wu Han limited her sound at the keyboard to something like a fortepiano’s volume, with Finckel mostly doubling her left hand quite softly. Intonation issues cropped up in both string parts, largely ironed out by the time the first movement’s exposition was repeated.

The much shorter slow movement combined subtle interplay from the strings, alongside rococo flourishes from the keyboard. The equally brief third movement featured the most technically impressive playing, albeit unsettled slightly by Hope’s occasional tendency to rush the tempo. A humorous grace-note motif, sharpened by chromatic dissonance, created humorous back and forth exchanges among all three players.

Hope has not been a regular visitor to Washington since around 2002 when he became the final violinist of the Beaux Arts Trio, which disbanded in 2008. He remains a finesse kind of player, gifted at the conversational exchange of chamber music more than bravura solo shows. In Beethoven’s early Piano Trio No. 1, all three musicians upgraded to a more expansive palette of sound, with a delicate touch in the first movement’s main motif, an upward reaching arpeggio.

Wu Han gave a lovely shape to the piano solo opening of the second movement, with especially fine interwoven string lines in the minor section. Haydnesque wit pervaded the last two movements in charming ways, with grace-note touches reminiscent of the first work heard on this concert. Both pianist and cellist brought out a folk-like drone motif in the Scherzo, contrasted with a more serene Trio.

The Finale bubbled with winking, dance-like melodies, the sixteenth-note runs moving along with facility in Wu Han’s right hand at a fast tempo. All three musicians exaggerated the sudden shift of character in this movement, as Beethoven twists through some wild chromatic vagaries, weaving them together in a thicket of counterpoint. This proved one last poke of the elbow in this jovial piece.

After intermission came the romantic arrival point of the evening in Dvořák’s Piano Trio No. 4. Known as the “Dumky” for its series of six movements organized around that musical form, the piece offered the largest volume yet from all three musicians. As both string players opened up their sound in the first movement, Hope’s intonation suffered the most in the upper range. On the other hand, he produced an intense, polished tone with a mute on the strings in the second movement.

In all of the movements, all three musicians created the sense of folk music’s flexibility of tempo with characteristic and unified accelerations and slow-downs. In the third movement, Wu Han’s serene playing suited the opening section, with the customary contrasting fast sections creating more intonation issues for the strings. In the last three movements, the interpretation reached its apogee, a combination of plangent slow tunes and exhilarating fast responses, flowing from one to the other with remarkable and consistent ease. Hope’s best playing at both top and bottom of his range came in these sections.

Continuing what felt like a tour of piano trio favorites was the single encore: the second movement of Mendelssohn’s Piano Trio No. 1.

Cellist Ani Aznavoorian and pianist Marta Aznavoorian perform cello sonatas by Debussy and Brahms, as well as music of Komitas, Falla, and Paganini 7:30 p.m. March 27. wolftrap.org