Lebenslust und Liebesleid - SHALOM-MUSIK.KOELN

Trio Accento

When the Cologne pianist and composer Maria Herz moved to England with her husband Albert in 1904, she had already completed professional training in the piano class of Max Pauer, professor at the Cologne Conservatory. In England, she deepened her musical education and took composition lessons with the composer and painter Arthur Edmund Grimshaw. At the time, she was living in Hipperholme in West Yorkshire. It was there that she made her first compositional attempts, which she considered so successful that she gave them an opus number. After variations on a theme by Chopin, she composed 12 Ländler, waltzes in the style of Schubert's "German Dances".

The Viennese composer and violin virtuoso Fritz Kreisler was already world-famous when Wilhelm Furtwängler invited him to join the Berlin Philharmonic in 1933. Kreisler's refusal is remarkable: "I am therefore determined to postpone my appearance in Germany until the right of all artists to carry out their activities in Germany, regardless of origin, religion or nationality, has become an irrefutable fact. I trust that I will soon be granted the opportunity to make music with you." Kreisler actually emigrated to the USA in 1939 and never returned to Europe. "Liebesleid" is one of his best-known genre pieces based on old Viennese dance tunes, published in 1905 and often played by the composer as an encore.

Jacques Offenbach was born in Cologne on the Großer Griechenmarkt, but the young family soon moved a few meters from here to Glockengasse, where his father Isaac Offenbach worked as a cantor in the new synagogue. His parents soon sent the highly talented boy to Paris, where he studied cello at the famous conservatory. As an 18-year-old bohemian in financial difficulties, Offenbach met Friedrich von Flotow, seven years his senior, who gave him access to the Parisian salons. From then on, the two composed and performed together; Introduction et Valse mélancolique op. 14 is a piece that caused a sensation in the salons, and Offenbach was soon regarded as the best cellist of his time.

Finally, Shlomo Gronich is a well-known Israeli composer of pop and folk songs. His bittersweet declaration of love for Tel Aviv was originally written to a text by Meir Wieseltier and is one of his best-known songs: "I sympathize with conceptual art in Tel Aviv, a city without a concept. The plaster is crumbling, a shutter is sobbing, a bus is dead. An unexcited city. A desperate hiding place made of plaster. A metal rocker makes noise. I sympathize with desperate people in Tel Aviv.

Felix Mendelssohn's second piano trio was composed in Frankfurt in the spring of 1845. Four days before Christmas, the composer premiered it at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig. With typical understatement, he said that it was "a bit nasty" for the pianist to play, as the breakneck passages in the fast movements eloquently testify. In terms of compositional technique, it is undoubtedly a highly demanding piece. The first movement is truly an "Allegro energico e con fuoco", an allegro of gloomy energy and seething fire. After this dramatic opening movement, Mendelssohn deliberately began the "Andante espressivo" simply: as a "song without words" in the piano. The E flat major melody is taken up by the strings and transformed into a natural idyll over the gentle lapping of the piano waves.

CONTRIBUTORS

Trio Accento

Felix Klein, violin

Ramon Jaffé, violoncello

Heidemarie Wiesner, piano

Start of each concert

15:15 / 16:15 / 17:15