An Introduction To Parry's Piano Trio No.2 And Stanford's Piano Trio Op.35, With Comparisons To Aspects Of The Piano Trios Of Brahms

The piano trio has been a very popular instrumental genre in Europe since the eighteenth century. Many composers wrote piano trios with a scoring for piano, violin, and cello. The genre reached its highest point in the nineteenth century, especially in Germany. Schubert, Mendelssohn, Schumann, and Brahms wrote numerous piano trios, which are very well-known and frequently performed today. In addition, these repertoires became a model for other composers outside of Germany during the nineteenth century. Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) was the master of piano-trio writing, and in many respects was considered the successor to Beethoven (1770-1827). His music became a model for piano-trio composers in the nineteenth century. Charles Hubert Hastings Parry (1848- 1918) and Charles Villiers Stanford (1852-1924) are English composers who seem to have observed Brahms’ piano trios carefully. Although their piano trios are much less well-known compared to those by Brahms, their works reveal similarities of melodic contours, intervals, textures, and pianism. A profound lyricism is also displayed in their piano trios. In this paper I introduce Parry’s Piano Trio No. 2 in B minor and Stanford’s Piano Trio Op. 35 No. 1 in Eflat major, exploring the similarities with Brahms’s Piano Trios Op. 8 in B major (1854) and Op. 87 in C major.U of I OnlyUIUC School of Music polic