Lincoln Trio - Ernst Bacon/ Leo Sowerby: Trios from the City of Big Shoulders

The twice-Grammy-nominated Lincoln Trio � violinist Desir�e Ruhstrat, cellist David Cunliffe, and pianist Marta Aznavoorian � offers engaging, rarely heard piano trios by 20th-century Chicago composers Leo Sowerby, winner of the Rome Prize and Pulitzer Prize for music, and Ernst Bacon, recipient of three Guggenheim Fellowships and a Pulitzer Fellowship. Bacon�s Trio No. 2 for Violin, Cello and Piano (1987) receives its world-premiere recording. Hailed by The New York Times as 'a Composer Known for Echoing America,' Bacon infuses the six-movement trio with American influences including marches, folksong-like melodies, and jazz rhythms, validating Virgil Thomson�s assessment of Bacon�s music as 'full of melody and variety; honest and skillful and beautiful.' Sowerby�s Trio for violin, violincello and pianoforte (1953) is 'a work of tremendous integrity' that exhibits an 'imposing structure, contrapuntal gymnastics, and a concern for instruments sounding as good as they can' (Classical Net). Sometimes virtuosic, sometimes reflective, the work is distinguished by an ever-evolving rhythmic and harmonic interplay between instruments.