style. The impact of this work was so strong in the Soviet Union that its

performance was forbidden from 1948 until shortly after Stalin’s death

in 1953. Shostakovich, a lover of all humanity, could not remain 

indifferent to injustice. Like so many of his works, this trio is a personal 

protest.

Program notes on Shostakovich by Rostislav Dubinsky,

and on Ben-Haim and Mendelssohn by The Jerusalem Trio,

adapted and edited by Elmer Booze

Concerts at the National Gallery ofArt

March 2002

March

10 Earl Wild, pianist

17 Amsterdam Loeki

Stardust Quartet

24 Alicia de Larrocha,

pianist

Presented in honor of

the exhibition Goya:

Images ofWomen

31 No concert

Mozart: Sonata in F, KV. 332

Beethoven: Variations in C Minor

Mendelssohn: Rondo capriccioso

Chopin: Various works

Music for recorders by Merula,

Locke, Sammartini, Pachelbel, and

other composers

Granados: Goyescas, Part II

Works by Soler, Albeniz and

Montsalvatge

The use ofcameras or recording equipment during

the performance is not allowed. Please be sure that cell

phones, pagers, and other electronic devices are turned off

The Sixtieth Season of

THE WILLIAM NELSON CROMWELL and

F. LAMMOT BELIN CONCERTS

National Gallery of Art

2412th Concert

THE JERUSALEM TRIO

YARON ROSENTHAL, piano

ROI SHILOAH, violin

ARIEL TUSHINSKY, cello

Sunday Evening, 3 March 2002

Seven O'clock

West Building, West Garden Court

Admission free
PROGRAM

Paul Ben-Haim 

(1897-1984)

Variations on a Hebrew Melody

(1939)

Introduction: Adagio misterioso 

Theme: Moderato e molto tranquillo 

Variation I: Piano solo

Variation II: Allegretto grazioso 

Variation III: Alla marcia

Variation IV: Moderato

Variation V: Molto vivace e tempestoso 

Variation VI: Molto tranquillo

Felix Mendelssohn

(1809-1847)

Piano Trio No. 1 in D Minor

Op. 49(1839)

Molto allegro ed agitato

Andante con molto tranquillo 

Scherzo: Leggiero e vivace 

Finale: Allegro assai appassionata

INTERMISSION

Dmitri Shostakovich 

(1906-1975)

Piano Trio No. 2

Op. 67(1944)

Andante; moderato 

Allegro non troppo

Largo; allegretto

Founded in Israel in 1989, The Jerusalem Trio has established a

reputation as Israel’s leading piano trio. Its thoughtful and passionate

musicianship has thrilled audiences in many countries, including the

United States, Canada, Japan, Germany, Israel, Australia, New Zealand,

and South America. The string magazine The Strad commented: “The

myriad colours they have at their disposal [assure them of] having the

hallmark of impending greatness.” Winner of the grand prize at the 1999

Osaka International Chamber Music Competition, the trio was also a

prizewinner of the 1995 Melbourne International Competition. As

individual competitors, members of the trio have won America-Israel 

Cultural Foundation scholarship awards. The trio has recorded the

Shostakovich and Ravel piano trios for JMC and has a highly acclaimed 

Brahms CD on the DOREMI label. The members of the trio teach at the

Rubin Music Academy at the Jerusalem Hebrew University.

Pianist Yaron Rosenthal, a first-prize winner of the Young Artist 

Competition in Jerusalem, has received the Gina Bachauer Award, the

Leonard Bernstein Fellowship at Tanglewood Music Center, and the

Italian government’s Award for the Arts. He has been a soloist with the

Philharmonia Orchestra at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center, the

Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the National Orchestra of RAI in Turin,

Italy, the Ordea Symphony Orchestra in Romania, the Santiago de Chile

Philharmonic, and the Camerate Virtuosi of New York. Rosenthal has

given recitals and chamber music concerts in Israel, North and South

America, Europe, South Africa, and Australia, and appeared at the Banff

and Tanglewood Festivals. His coach since 1995 has been pianist 

Murray Perahia.

Violinist Roi Shiloah first appeared with the Israel Philharmonic

Orchestra at the age of twelve. As a first-prize winner of the 1992

Franqois Shapira Competition, he has appeared frequently with the Israel

Philharmonic under the baton of Maestro Zubin Mehta. In addition, he

has performed as soloist with the Young Israel Philharmonic in Europe,

the Berlin Radio Orchestra, the London Symphony, the Frankfurt Radio

Orchestra, the Sofia Philharmonic, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and

the Royal Symphony of Flanders. As a recitalist, Shiloah has performed 

in Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center, the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, and
the Albert Hall in London, among others. A former student of Haim

Taub, Shiloah plays a Guadagnini violin loaned by the America-Israel 

Cultural Foundation.

A winner of the Clairmint competition in Israel, cellist Ariel

Tushinsky appeared as soloist with various orchestras, including the

Israeli Philharmonic Orchestra under Maestro Mehta. He has also

performed with the late violinist Isaac Stem and pianist Yefim

Bronfmann in chamber music concerts. The list of major venues in

which he has played includes Avery Fisher Hall, the Alte Oper in

Frankfurt, the Philharmonic in Berlin, the Mann Auditorium in Tel-Aviv,

and the Melbourne Symphony Hall in Australia. Tushinsky records for

radio stations and gives recitals and chamber music concerts in Israel,

Europe, South America, Australia, and the United States. A former 

student of Bernard Greenhouse and Aldo Parissot at Yale University, he

plays a cello on loan from the Raitman Tubert Collection of Mendoza,

Argentina.

Paul Ben-Haim, one of the best-known and most important Israeli

composers, wrote Variations on a Hebrew Melody during his early

compositional period. The 1939 work is based on a tune, probably of

Bedouin origin, that was familiar to early settlers of the region that 

became the state of Israel in 1948. The trio begins with an introduction 

{Adagio misterioso) that prepares the mood for the theme, which is

presented by the violin and the cello using the mute {con sordino). The

theme concludes with the piano joining the strings in unison. Six

variations present changes of mood and instrumentation, but the piece

ends as it began, calmly and meditatively.

Mendelssohn’s brilliant and lyrical Piano Trio in D Minor, Op. 49, is

one of his most popular works. It was written between February and

September 1839, when the composer was thirty years old, and published 

the following year. Mendelssohn gave the first performance in Leipzig

on 1 February 1840 with cellist Carl Wittman and violinist Ferdinand

David, for whom the composer later wrote his E Minor Violin Concerto.

Robert Schumann highly praised the trio and hailed Mendelssohn as “the

Mozart of the nineteenth century, the most illuminating of musicians,

who sees more clearly than others through the contradictions of our era,

and is the first to reconcile them.” Both of the two themes of the first

movement {Molto allegro ed agitato) are introduced by the cello, the

first broad and melancholy and the second equally expressive. A stormy

development section and coda give ample scope for bravura display by

all three players. The second movement {Andante con moto tranquillo) is

reminiscent of a song without words. The main melody is in two parts,

each of which is introduced on the piano before being repeated by the

violin. A more agitated episode leads to a melodic reprise with a highly

elaborated accompaniment. The third movement {Scherzo: Leggiero e

vivace) manifests Mendelssohn’s unique skill in rendering elfin lightness

and sparkle. There is no trio in this movement, but variety and contrast 

are achieved by ingenious scoring. The Finale (Allegro assai

appassionato) opens with a gypsylike theme on the piano alone. The tail

of this melody becomes a motif shared and developed by all three

instruments. The cello introduces a second more lyrical theme with a

triplet figure accompaniment on the piano. Dynamic contrasts abound in

this movement, which reaches a climax with a coda that increases in

volume and animation up to the very end.

Shostakovich, who died in 1975, was one of the great Russian

composers of the Soviet period. He left a major musical legacy: fifteen

symphonies, nine operas and ballets, fifteen quartets, a number of

instrumental concerti, several vocal cycles, and works for various

chamber ensembles. His Piano Trio, Op. 67, written in 1944, the fourth

year of Russia’s involvement in World War II, is his personal protest 

against violence and anti-Semitism. Although there is no published 

program for the work, each movement has implicit meaning. The first

movement {Andante; moderato), as in many of Shostakovich’s chamber 

and symphonic works, describes a day before disaster, full of

apprehension and fear. The second movement {Allegro non troppo) is a

furious dance, calling to mind a dance of death, perhaps a dance of

people condemned. The following slow movement {Largo; allegro) is a

funereal passacaglia with sustained ringing chords, descriptive of the

striking of iron bars that was used in Russian prison camps to call

prisoners together. The climax of the work comes in the last movement 

{Allegretto), which is based on several melodies composed in the Jewish