Józef Wieniawski – the younger brother of the famous violinist Henryk Wieniawski – was a highly regarded pianist, pedagogue, and composer. From an early age, he also performed as a chamber musician, often concertizing with his brother and leading European virtuosos. He graduated from the Paris Conservatory with the highest honors, later refining his musical skills under the tutelage of Ferenc Liszt in Weimar and further developing his compositional craft with Adolf B. Marx in Berlin. His compositions – now being rediscovered and restored to the musical repertoire – exhibit a French sensitivity to tonal color and a German discipline in formal construction.
The G Major Trio, Op. 40 for violin, cello, and piano was published in Brussels in 1885, where Józef Wieniawski settled in the late 1870s. He held a position as a piano professor at the conservatory while continuing an active concert career and contributing to the city’s vibrant musical life. The trio was most likely composed with Wieniawski himself in mind as the performer of the piano part, which, like the parts for the other instruments, demands a high level of technical skill. The four-movement cycle is structured according to the norms of the period, with a slow second movement, a scherzo in the third position, and outer movements in sonata form. The work’s heightened virtuosity is beautifully balanced by its expressive qualities. In the landscape of 19th-century Polish music, alongside Chopin’s G minor Trio, it stands as one of the finest compositions in this genre.
The program for the inaugural concert of the 6th Festival of Romantic Compositions – Elsner and His Successors – features the revived G Major Trio, Op. 40 by Józef Wieniawski and Chopin’s youthful G minor Trio, Op. 8, composed during his studies with Józef Elsner and completed in the spring of 1828, yet already marked by the distinctive individuality of its creator. The evening will also include a transcription of the magnificent Chaconne in Memoriam Giovanni Paolo II (2005) by Krzysztof Penderecki, part of his Polish Requiem, transcribed for trio by his student, South Korean composer Jeajoon Ryu. The performers for this concert are violinist Maria Machowska, cellist Magdalena Bojanowicz, and pianist Łukasz Krupiński.
