Monica Huggett

‘La Gamme (et autres morceaux de simphonie)’ heralds the return of Sonnerie to the trio format and marks their debut recording on Linn Records.

The all-French programme of music by composers Marin Marais and Antoine Forqueray recalls the Songs of the Auvergne and the beautiful French countryside.

Trio Sonnerie delivers an expertly phrased and highly nuanced performance of Marias’ La Gamme.

Marais’ contemporary Forqueray provides a welcome addition to the programme. His own prowess on the viol inspired his fiendishly virtuosic Suite No. 1 which stretched the performers to achieve new heights.

Each performer has the opportunity to shine with the clean, crisp lines leaving no room for anything other than top notch playing.

Trio Sonnerie (Monica Huggett director & violin, Emilia Benjamin viola da gamba and James Johnstone harpsichord) is one of the longest established and most highly regarded chamber groups working in Europe today.

Trio Sonnerie and Sonnerie, its alter ego, has made countless recordings and played in most national and international early music festivals.

The musicians bring to this repertoire ‘playing of real elegance’ (The Independent) and ‘one could even go as far as to say musical bliss!’ (The Times).

Ensemble Marsyas’ debut recording on Linn features three of the extraordinary trio sonatas by the Bohemian composer Jan Dismas Zelenka (1679-1745) for violin, two oboes, bassoon and continuo on period instruments.

These sonatas represent the most spectacularly challenging music ever written for wind instruments in terms of their utopian demands on the technique of the players, their musical integrity and their breathtaking scale.

This repertoire saw the ensemble awarded both first prize and the audience prize at the 2007 Brugge International Competition.

The Edinburgh based chamber group comprises the best of a new generation of musicians specialising in early music from across Europe.

Ensemble Marsyas is Peter Whelan - bassoon, Josep Domènech Lafont - oboe, Molly Marsh - oboe, Thomas Dunford - theorbo, Philippe Grisvard - harpsichord/organ, Christine Sticher - violone.

They are joined for this recording by Baroque violinist Monica Huggett who is a multiple Gramophone Award winner and Grammy nominee.

The members of Ensemble Marsyas have been awarded accolades by both critics and the recording industry alike - the most recent including a 2010 Gramophone Award for a recording featuring Peter Whelan.

The Benvenue Fortepiano Trio concludes its acclaimed and ear-opening traversal of period-instrument performances of Schumann's Piano Trios, supplemented with the Piano Quartet and Kinderszenen.

The Benvenue Fortepiano Trio's acclaimed accounts of Schumann's First and Third Piano Trios opened the ears of chamber music devotees with the crystalline textures of its period instruments and the drawing-room intimacy of its interpretations. Anchored by the enterprising violinist Monica Huggett who has produced numerous chart-topping recordings and a Grammy® nomination for AVIE, the Trio completes Schumann's canon for the genre, complementing the Second Trio with the Piano Quartet and casting the spotlight on Eric Zivian and his mellifluous 1841 instrument with his rendition of Schumann's beloved Kinderszenen.

The Benvenue Fortepiano Trio bowed on Avie earlier this year with an ear-opening account of Mendelssohn’s Piano Trios. They return with another rarity, Schumann’s Piano Trios performed on period instruments. Anchored by the enterprising violinist Monica Huggett, whose releases on Avie have made the Top Five of the Billboard Classical Chart and earned a Grammy nomination, the Benvenues historically-informed style lend a unique clarity to these early romantic masterpieces. This is the first of two releases by The Benvenue Fortepiano Trio surveying Schumann’s works for the genre.