Bohémo Trio: Reicha

The Strad Issue: June 2026

Description: Strong advocacy makes a case for a contemporary of Beethoven

Musicians: Bohémo Trio

Works: Reicha: Six Piano Trios op.101

Catalogue number: SUPRAPHON SU4363-2 (2 CDs)

Poor old Antoine (or Antonín) Reicha: friend of Beethoven, pupil of Salieri, professor of fugue and counterpoint at the Paris Conservatoire – and architect of unwieldy piano cycles designed more for improvement than entertainment. A certain fustiness clings to him as a result – a sort of Czech Czerny. Now the Bohémo Trio alights on a set of six piano trios that to some extent bear out an early appraisal that his works are ‘more remarkable for novelty of combination and striking harmonies than for abundance of charm and ideas’.

That’s a little unfair. I can honestly say that Reicha’s op.101 held my attention from beginning to end, even if the abiding memory is more of the effect of the music than of any individual ideas. Reicha’s procedure is largely to develop through repetition, re-voicing and applying ever-more complex figuration, and his instinct is for virtuosity (especially for the piano) rather than motivic argument à la Beethoven. The intellectual weight of the works is front-loaded to their sonata-form openers, while slow movements never delve too deeply and finales are generally joyous romps. The instruments are deployed equitably and skilfully. Reicha is clearly his own man, but beyond a penchant for harmonic sleights of hand, an individual voice rarely bubbles up to the surface.

The players of the Bohémo Trio are nevertheless unimpeachable advocates for his music, and clearly think enough of it to import producer Andrew Keener and engineer Oscar Torres to catch them in state-of-the-art sound at Vienna’s University of Music and Performing Arts. If ultimately, perhaps, I wasn’t left feeling these works have penetrated the Czech trio’s soul, the performances bristle with the thrill of discovery.

David Threasher