Trio for Violin, Viola, and Cello
Jean Françaix

- Born May 23, 1912, in Le Mans
- Died September 25, 1997, in Paris
- Composed in 1933
- First CMS performance on April 29, 1998, by violinist Ani Kavafian, violist Paul Neubauer, and cellist Fred Sherry
- Duration: 13 minutes

In 1927, brothers Jean, Pierre, and Etienne Pasquier formed what was at the time a rather unlikely fixed chamber ensemble. There simply wasn’t that much music for violin, viola, and cello. W. A. Mozart’s 1788 Divertimento, a handful of early works by Ludwig van Beethoven, the odd Romantic suite or serenade by the likes of Jean Sibelius or Ernő Dohnányi—it was repertoire that could fill a few concerts, but not a whole career. The Pasquier Trio stayed active by regularly teaming up with other musicians for concerts: with various violinists to form a quartet; with wind players to take a turn on Classical flute or oboe quartets; or with pianists, like their friend Jean Françaix, to play music for piano quartet. They were also in the business of commissioning new repertoire for string trio. They requested works from composers like Darius Milhaud, Bohuslav Martinů, and, in 1933, from Françaix, who penned for them a String Trio in C major.

On the whole, Françaix’s works tend to have short movements that display quick changes in harmony and humorous spins and turns, but with some consistency in character and atmosphere. The opening Allegretto vivo is a perfect example of this sort of music; its relentless perpetual motion supports a number of changes in instrumental texture and tonal color. The Scherzo is a dance whose steps are capriciously destabilized by syncopations and strummed chords on the wrong beats. In a wild middle section, the violin plays a drunken tune, and then the viola repeats it while the violin plays the gesture a half-step off. It’s a crunchy, unserious passage, rightfully marked “ironico” in the score.

Françaix’s sincere side comes out in the Andante. He was a gifted melodist, and here writes a tune that seamlessly moves between different time signatures: modal, almost medieval passages in 4 that are played to droning harmonies, and 3/4 passages that point back to the second movement with hints of a slow waltz. The finale, a Rondo that returns to the staccato textures of the opening movement, shows the composer experimenting with a modernist tendency to switch tracks abruptly. An eerie, slow passage in the middle of the movement represents an intrusion of Alban Berg. And the whole piece unexpectedly ends on a swaggering jig. It is perhaps a reappearance of the drunken fellow from the second movement, but rather than coming to an uproarious conclusion the music skips away on quiet, glassy gestures. It’s as if nothing in the preceding four movements had actually happened, but were just visions or distorted memories.

Cellist, writer, and music researcher Nicky Swett is a PhD candidate and Gates Scholar at the University of Cambridge.