String trio

A string trio is a group of three string instruments or a piece written for such a group. The term is generally used with reference to works of chamber music from the Classical period to the present. From at least the 19th century on, the term "string trio" with otherwise unspecified instrumentation normally refers to the combination violin, viola and cello (cf "string quartet", "piano trio" etc.). This is how the term is used by major catalogs, including IMSLP.

History

The earliest string-trio form, found in the early Classical period, consisted of two violins and a cello, a grouping which had grown out of the Baroque trio sonata, while over the course of the 19th century the string trio scored for violin, viola, and cello came to be the predominant type (Tilmouth and Smallman 2001).

Beginning in the second half of the 18th century, although the trio configuration for two violins and cello was not wholly abandoned in classical chamber music (even during the 19th century), the scoring for violin, viola, and cello began to take precedence. Joseph Haydn appears to have been the first composer to use this combination (Tilmouth and Smallman 2001), though he was soon emulated by Luigi Boccherini (Kennedy 1994).

Divertimento in E-flat (Mozart)

The Divertimento in E flat major, K. 563, is a string trio, written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1788, the year in which he completed his last three symphonies and his "Coronation" Piano Concerto. It is widely regarded as separate from his other divertimenti.

The work was completed in Vienna on September 27, 1788, and is dedicated to Michael Puchberg, a fellow Freemason, who lent money to Mozart. The premiere was in Dresden on April 13, 1789 with Anton Teyber taking the violin part, Mozart playing viola and Antonín Kraft playing cello. At the time Mozart was conducting a tour of German cities, on his way to Berlin; see Mozart's Berlin journey.

Movements

String Trio (Schubert)

Franz Schubert wrote three string trios, all of them in the key of B-flat major. From the first of these, D 111A, a trio Schubert wrote in 1814, only a few measures are extant. The string trio D 471 consists of a completed first movement and an incomplete second movement, composed in 1816. The last of these trios, D 581, was completed in four movements, exists in two versions and was composed in 1817.

String Trio in B-flat major, D 111A

A few bars of an Allegro movement is all what is left of the string trio D 111A, composed in September 1814. The fragment is printed in the New Schubert Edition.

String Trio in B-flat major, D 471

Schubert started composing this piece in September of 1816, but only finished the first movement. In 1890 this movement was the only content of Series VI, Trio für Streichinstrument of the Alte Gesamt-Ausgabe, and was as such republished by Dover Editions in 1965. The second unfinished movement was first published in 1897, in the first volume of the Revisionsbericht of the Alte Gesamt-Ausgabe.