Hoover/Tao Duo

Having worked and performed with a trio for ten years and enjoying this process of an in-depth exploration of the literature, Patricia found a partner in cellist Marina Hoover, who was a founding member of the internationally recognized and award-winning St. Lawrence String Quartet for thirteen years. Marina has been praised by the National Post for her “passionate but rock-solid approach” and her “discretion and generosity” (Edmonton Journal).

For both of them, much of the enjoyment comes with rehearsal, exploration, experimentation, and searching for musical solutions and a single voice to any work.

Now these two veterans of the chamber music world have joined forces to explore the great cello-piano literature.

Hoover/Tao Duo
performs Chopin, Liszt, Strauss

Reviews

New Classik Reviews
Atlanta Audio Society
October 2007

Cellist Marina Hoover and pianist Patricia Tao present a program of Romantic music that demonstrates, among other things, what the expressive marking cantabile (songlike) means. An ideal team, Hoover and Tao bring out the expressive and dynamic qualities of their instruments in a recital in which each complements the other perfectly.

Frederic Chopin’s Sonata in G Minor, Op. 65, a rare work of the composer that is not solely for piano, owes its existence to his friendship with cellist August Franchomme. This work has a wonderful sense of movement, and not just in the perpetual-motion finale. A brisk, adventuresome Allegro opening movement, its gracefully balanced theme gliding down and back, is followed by a Scherzo whose trio section is lovelier and more songlike than most composers’ slow movements. The all-too-brief Largo is followed by a lively finale in which the jaunty theme moves along merrily by leaps and skips — a pure delight.

A stunning contrast with the Chopin sonata in terms of mood, texture and harmony is Franz Liszt’s La lugubre gondola (The Funereal Gondola), in the 1885 version by the composer that really brings out the sustained chromatic power and deep lyric beauty of the work. This is avant-garde Liszt, anticipating the music of the 20^th century in its spare texture and uncompromising chromatic harmony. Inspired by the sight of the waterborne gondolas draped in black crepe that Liszt witnessed during his sojourn in Venice, the music is slow and elegiac, conveying a feeling of feeling of utter resignation.

Richard Strauss’ Sonata in F Minor, Op. 6 by contrast is vigorous, brilliant, and extroverted. A remarkably secure work of craftsmanship by the composer who was still in his teens at the time, it inevitably reveals the influence of older composers, with nods to both Mendelssohn and Wagner. It also anticipates, with a lyricism that Hoover and Tao obviously relish in this performance, the future master of German art song.

American Record Guide
Jan/Feb 2008
David Moore

This program gives us two of the romantic era's most lyrical cello sonatas. Hoover has a lyric gift that makes her interpretation very effective. She sings her way through this material in a way that brings out the poetry in both works.

The Liszt piece serves to emphasize the dark side of the period. Altogether, this is a fine interpretation. I only wish that the players had trusted their imaginations to allow them to observe the repeat in the first movement of the Chopin. I'm sure they would have found something new to say the second time through.

But that's the only negative point. Those who feel strongly about this and who don't need the Liszt piece might look for the performance of both of these sonatas by Lluis Claret and Alain Planes (Harmonia Mundi 1901370, May/June 1995.) I have been happy with that, but I would be happy with this one, too.