We invite you to an emotional and thought-provoking concert!
This time trio (Camillo Cabassi, Jorma Toots and Vitalij Regensperger) will perform piano trios from
Shostakovich and Schnittke.

All three emotionally charged works were composed during periods of emotional upheaval in the lives
of their creators.

Shostakovich’s created his first piano in 1923, being just 16 years of age. He had just lost his father and
short after diagnosed with tuberculosis. He was sent to Crimea to recuperate. There he fell in love with
the daughter of a Moscow professor. The piece is a passionate work, a kaleidoscope of emotions ranging
from ecstasy to despair.

Twenty-one years later, in the midst of the 2nd World War, Shostakovich completed his Piano Trio No.2
(op. 67). This extraordinarily painful work, was born out of the appalling sufferings of his fellowcountrymen.
Also marked by a close encounter with death, Schnittke’s only Piano Trio originated as a string trio. Soon
after completing the trio, Schnittke suffered the first of a series of massive strokes, but in 1992 he
revisited the work, dedicating the version for piano trio to his doctor. It is written very much in the style
of Shostakovich’s music but is, if anything, even grimmer and more pessimistic than that latter’s op. 67.
Schnittke’s uniquely drawn visions of despair, irony, violence and nostalgia cannot help but exert a
powerful spell over even the most skeptical of listeners.

Tickets (10€/6€) are sold on spot half an hour before the concert. Cash only.
The concert is supported by Cultural Endowment of Estonia.