Although there were once some 200 Chaminade Clubs in the U.S. alone, the music of Cécile Chaminade, France's foremost female composer of the late Romantic era, has not been well served on recordings. Her piano music is beginning to reappear, but the works for piano trio and the duo pieces on this disc from Germany's MDG label are very rare finds. Chaminade's larger works, such as the two piano trios heard here, tend to follow Germanic rather than French models.

This is definitely a Beethoven footnote, but an interesting one: two arrangements by the composer, one substituting a violin for the clarinet in his Clarinet Trio, the other reducing the Second Symphony to a Piano Trio. The violin version of the Clarinet Trio just seems like a compromise, and the piece misses the color of the clarinet. Paradoxically, trimming down the scoring of the Second Symphony results in a worthwhile alternate, in which listeners who know the Symphony well may be fascinated by the way the great composer attempts to reproduce his orchestral effects with smaller forces.

Trio Parnassus adopts flowing tempos for the “Archduke” trio, which fits into the ensemble’s overall “classical” conception of the work, quite removed from the Beaux Arts Trio’s slower and lovingly elevated performance that holds your attention by its sheer beauty of execution. There’s beauty aplenty in Parnassus’ playing as well, particularly in the serene Andante cantabile, where each variation unfolds in warmly glowing tone colors.

This seems to be a golden age for piano trios: such groups are springing up everywhere, like daffodils in the springtime. The Trio Parnassus are an experienced world-class ensemble who have garnered an extensive discography, and deservedly so.The present disc is hailed as the opening salvo in a complete recorded cycle of the Beethoven piano trios and I am much impressed.

Johann Nepomuk Hummel was one of the finest composers bridging the gap between the Classical and Romantic eras. His teachers included Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven, and Hummel learned his lessons very well. His music is notable for its harmonious treatments, expert architecture and never-ending string of attractive melodies.

While it is always wonderful to have a recording of Schumann's early C minor Piano Quartet coupled with his mature E flat major Piano Quartet, the result of that coupling is usually only half a disc of listenable music. Because while the E flat major quartet is surely one of the masterpieces of the repertoire, the C minor quartet is, as its composer once sadly described it, "botched." The reason for this is straight-forward. The E flat quartet written when Schumann was 32 has the passion of youth joined with the technique of maturity, while the C minor quartet written when the composer was 19 has the passion of youth expressed without temperance – or indeed, competence.

Unlike those of his elite fellow executant-composers such as Rode, Spohr, or Viotti, Molique’s violin concertos never really made it, whether as concert vehicles or as student practice works. His chamber music too was long ignored and it’s really only in recent years that labels have begun to explore it. CPO has been recording the quartets and now MDG turns to the piano trios in its first volume of a series.

This is the second disc devoted by the Chinese-German Trio Parnassus to the chamber music of Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia, the dedicatee of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 3. The prince was an aristocratic patron for whom the irascible Beethoven actually had musical respect, noting that he played not "in a princely or royal manner but rather like a competent piano player." Ferdinand, who was killed by Napoleon's troops in 1806, in turn venerated Beethoven, but the strongest tribute to his talent is that as a composer he wrote music that neither aped Beethoven's nor took refuge in Classical models.

This two-hour double-disc set of Joseph Rheinberger's complete piano trios is a hefty contribution to the rehabilitation of the composer's oeuvre, though it may be more than the average listener can appreciate in one sitting. Rheinberger's music is earnest and perhaps too heavy for some tastes, and it may even seem too stodgy and dryly theoretical. In his mature Romantic style, his reliance on Classical form, and his pensive expression, Rheinberger often resembles Brahms, though it must be said that he lacks Brahms' rhythmic ingenuity, contrapuntal dexterity, and emotional depth.