This collection of 18 piano trios dedicated to
Haydn is itself an homage on the centennial anniversary of another
Haydn homage: a collection of six piano pieces commissioned in 1909 by the Revue Musicale Mensuelle de la S.I.M. That project resulted in works by
Ravel,
Debussy,
Dukas, Reynaldo Hahn, d'Indy, and Widor; inasmuch as those works are not well known, it might have been interesting to juxtapose them with the present pieces in some way. As it is, the new trios fill three CDs. They are divided into an unusual set of categories, "Austria," "Europe," and "Continents," but the categories are mixed together in the program itself. One test for a musical tribute is whether you might guess the honoree without having prior background information, and certainly that's not a problem here; several pieces contain direct quotations from
Haydn's music (mostly not trios, which may not have been the best choice for the project as a whole), and each one handles the quotations in a different way. One of the choice contributions is Haydn-Destillate by German composer Dieter Schnebel (CD 3, tracks 2-3), which begins with the finale of
Haydn's String Quartet in B flat major, Op. 33/2, "The Joke," and variously either synthesizes or further atomizes its elements. Also making use of
Haydn directly are
Lalo Schifrin's Elegy and Meditation (CD 3, track 1) and
William Bolcom's Introduction and Rondo: Haydn Go Seek (CD 2, track 1), and it is a pleasure to have contributions from these two aging giants of composition in the Western hemisphere. The pieces that do not refer directly to
Haydn's thematic material are generally in modern idioms. They fall roughly into four groups: those that take
Haydn's tightly knit thematic structure as a starting point, those influenced more generally by his humorous mood, those that use single features of
Haydn's music that connote something to non-Western hearers, and those with more tenuous connections. Among the most intriguing is Two Nguni Dances by South African composer Bongani Ndodana-Breen, which could fall into both the second or third categories; Ndodana-Breen states as his inspiration
Haydn's use of folk or folk-like melodies, adapting them to African polyrhythms transferred to the piano trio medium, and fitting with the
Haydn spirit surprisingly well. A few works feel as though they were already in progress and then had the
Haydn label slapped on top, but generally an intriguing collection that could serve as a useful overview of the question of how contemporary composers see their work in relation to the High Classical tradition.