Rediscovery of Charming Piano Trios Following compositions by Josef Marx, on its new cpo CD the Hyperion Trio turns to the piano trios of Robert Kahn, a composer who was born in Mannheim in 1865 and was very highly valued by Johannes Brahms. And the feeling was mutual: when Kahn met Brahms, he went away with great enthusiasm for him. In 1947 he wrote, ""From my early youth I had deep love and admiration for Brahms as a musician. To this was added, when he so friendlily received me in Vienna, a deep, even rapturous love for Brahms as a human being, a love that filled my whole heart but that in my shy reserve I carefully hid from him."" Kahn studied with Friedrich Keil in Berlin and with Josef Rheinberger in Munich and went on to reside in Berlin as a composer. He was appointed to a teaching post at the Royal Academy in Berlin in 1894 and continued to serve in this capacity until his expulsion by the Nazis in 1934. Wilhelm Kempff, Ferdinand Leitner, Nikos Skalkottas, Günter Raphael, and Arthur Rubinstein numbered among his most famous students. Kahn was forced into emigration in 1934; he went to England and remained there until the end of his life. Most of Kahn's published works in general and his chamber music in particular are from the years of the German Empire, which has to be regarded as his central creative period. He wrote all four of his original piano trios prior to 1918. These works are distinguished by their comprehensibility and concise three-part design and delight audiences with their charm and colorful verve.
