The critics of Gramophone magazine have been choosing their favourite discs of the year for the December issue, and Peter Quantrill has chosen the Florestan Trio’s latest disc, of Haydn Trios (volume 2), as his personal favourite of 2009.  He writes: ‘I can’t remember a disc of more good, serious fun than the envoi to Haydn […]

We were rehearsing this week in the home of a friend who keeps a pet canary in a cage in the kitchen. The canary was silent as we arrived and sat round the table, chatting and drinking coffee. But as soon as we went next door, picked up our instruments and started to play, the canary […]

For the past few days the trio has been rehearsing intensively. Over the next ten days we have two concerts at the Bath Mozartfest, a fundraising concert and dinner for the Florestan Trust, a concert at the University of Cambridge, a concert in the Wigmore Hall (with a world premiere), and three concerts in the Gulbenkian […]

At last the printed score has arrived for the trio by Huw Watkins. We’re giving the world premiere in the Wigmore Hall on November 25. When the newly published score arrived, I already knew the notes of the piano part, because I’ve been working from an electronic PDF which I printed out on loose A4 […]

To Steinway Hall in London, to choose a piano for the Florestan Trio’s  Hyperion recording of Shostakovich next January. Whenever I’m able to select an piano, I have to do my research well ahead of time, because the best ones get booked up months in advance. Each piano is slightly different from the next, so for each new […]