Piano_Trio_No._2_(Schubert)
The Piano Trio No. 2 in E-flat major for piano, violin, and cello, D. 929, was one of the last compositions completed by Franz Schubert, dated November 1827. It was published by Probst as Opus 100 in late 1828, shortly before the composer's death and first performed at a private party in January 1828 to celebrate the engagement of Schubert's school-friend Josef von Spaun. The Trio was among the few of his late compositions Schubert heard performed before his death.[1] It was given its first private performance by Carl Maria von Bocklet on the piano, Ignaz Schuppanzigh playing the violin, and Josef Linke playing cello.
Like Schubert's other piano trio, this is a comparatively larger work than most piano trios of the time, taking almost 50 minutes to perform. The second theme of the first movement is based loosely on the opening theme of the Minuet and Trio of Schubert's G major sonata (D. 894). Scholar Christopher H. Gibbs asserts direct evidence of Beethoven's influence on the Trio.[2]
The main theme of the second movement was used as one of the central musical themes in Stanley Kubrick's 1975 film Barry Lyndon. It has also been used in a number of other films, including The Hunger, Crimson Tide, The Piano Teacher, L'Homme de sa vie, Land of the Blind, Recollections of the Yellow House, The Way He Looks, The Mechanic, Miss Julie, The Congress, the HBO miniseries John Adams, the FX miniseries Mrs. America, two episodes of American Crime Story, as the opening piece for the ABC documentary The Killing Season, used throughout the BBC documentary Auschwitz: The Nazis and 'The Final Solution', and in the 2023 biographical film, Dance First, about Irish playwright Samuel Beckett.
The autograph has been preserved since 1955 in a private collection in Switzerland.
