The Florestan Trio acquired their name from Schumann (Florestan was the name he gave to the extrovert, optimistic side of his personality, the alter ego of Eusebius, who represented his dreamy introspection) and are surveying some of the composer's chamber music in three Wigmore Hall programmes this autumn.
Running through the series are Schumann's three piano trios; this night the Florestan were playing the last of them, the G minor Op 110, framed by the Marchenbilder for viola and piano, and the Piano Quartet. This was chamber-music playing of a very high order. The Florestan players (pianist Susan Tomes, violinist Anthony Marwood and cellist Richard Lester) have a marvellous understanding of each other's musicality: they listen intently and respond sympathetically, so that every performance unfolds with complete naturalness.
Tomes is the Eusebius of this group: her piano sound is luminous, with every chord voiced individually, her quiet playing is compelling. That isn't to say that she's any less convincing when assertive - she urged along the scherzo of the Trio and launched the finale, with its theme that sounds like a jokey version of the one that begins Schumann's Piano Quintet, with infectious energy.
Equally, her colleagues are capable of quiet thoughtfulness: the way the violin and cello melodies intertwined in the slow movement was magically poised. They made the best possible case for the G minor Trio, which is often dismissed as late, uneven Schumann. With the viola player Thomas Riebl (who had given a wiry, unprepossessing account of Marchenbilder), they illuminated every facet of the Piano Quartet, pointing up its debts - to Beethoven (via Mendelssohn) in the first movement and to Mendelssohn himself in the scherzo - yet fully charting the emotional ebb and flow, and quixotic changes of mood that are its Schumannesque imprint.
The Piano Quartet isn't such a flashily impressive piece as the Quintet (Clara Schumann seems to have been rather sniffy about it), but as the Florestan showed, it is full of understated beauties, which were perfectly presented here.
• Final concert on October 1.
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