By Daniel Buckwalter
Conversations were plentiful to open Chamber Music Amici’s 2026-27 season. Whether via casual snippets, endearingly tender moments, or stirring conversations, Amici offered its audiences a full spectrum of insight into how instruments can talk to one another.
It all took place on Oct. 18 and 19 at Springfield’s Wildish Theater with the Three Bs concert, a tip of the cap to Johann Sebastian Bach, Ludwig van Beethoven and Johannes Brahms.
Performed by Amici pianist and artistic director Eunhye Grace Choi, violinist Tomás Cotik and cellist Steven Pologe, the program opened with Bach’s Two-Part Inventions for Violin and Cello.
It’s a short, engaging, three-movement piece which, as Cotik and Pologe played it, evoked images of friends walking on a sidewalk, perhaps on their way to lunch and catching up with one another.
And who among us has not eavesdropped, if only for two or three seconds, on such fragments of conversation between two people as you walk by? It can be humorous; it can be informative.
Beethoven’s Piano Trio in E-flat Major is at times a spirited piece surrounding affectionate lyricism which, with Choi at the piano, was beautiful to hear.
So, too, was Brahms’ Piano Trio in C Minor, with its intense opening and final movements surrounding the charming and lovely second and third movements.
Cotik and Pologe were outstanding, and it’s always a treat to both listen to and watch Choi play the piano. If you haven’t taken in a Chamber Music Amici performance, I would encourage you to do so. You’ll be glad you did.
Chamber Music Amici’s next concert — The Nordic Sound — will be performed on Dec. 6 and 7 at Wildish Theater at 630 Main St. in downtown Springfield. Details and ticket information can be found online at ChamberMusicAmici.org.
