For its second recording for Cypres, Kheops Ensemble immerses us in works that give pride of place to the clarinet, an instrument whose expressive possibilities fascinated the most original creators in the Habsburg capital at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Brahms's Trio Op. 114, dominated by autumnal colours, is an end-of-life work, imbued with a form of renunciation and resignation. The Four Pieces, Op. 5, dedicated to the master Schönberg, exude a striking expressiveness, the kind of expressiveness that Berg has always managed to preserve in all his research. In his Trio, Op. 3, Zemlinsky, who makes no secret of his admiration for Op. 114, develops an intense and tumultuous harmonic universe that marks the generational leap with Brahms. Kheops Ensemble, a variable-geometry group combining winds and strings under the sign of individual virtuosity at the service of the collective, radiates maturity and carries the colours of chamber music high in Belgium. © Cyprès