The Piano Trio No 1, Op 35, is an imaginative mixture of the learned style Turina acquired in Paris and folkloric inspiration provided by his homeland. The first movement is a prelude and fugue, blending the techniques of the contemporaneous French School with those of German masters such as Bach. The second movement is a theme and variations, a form which has a long tradition in Spanish music. In this case each of the variations evokes a dance from a different region of Spain: the muñeira, a miller’s dance from Galicia; the schotis, a dance of northern European origins but popular in Spain; the zortziko of the Basque region; the jota of Aragon; and the soleares of Turina’s native Andalucia. The third movement, in sonata form, reintroduces thematic materials from the first movement to give the entire opus a unifying ternary quality. The Piano Trio was dedicated to L’Infante Doña Isabel de Borbón and premiered in London on 5 July 1927.
from notes by William C Krause © 2012
