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Executive Producers: Carlos & Haydee Mollura

Beethoven String Trio in C Minor Opus 9, No. 3

I. Allegro con spirito

II. Adagio con espressione

III. Scherzo – Allegro molto e vivace

IV. Finale – Presto

Happy 250^th Birthday Beethoven! Your music sounds fresh, exciting and inspiring as it must have when you were alive and writing it in your young prime.  Amazing to have created this magnificent trio when you were only 27 years old.

Janaki’s debut album was one of the first I mastered for Yarlung Records at AcousTech in Camarillo. People still want to talk about it at audiophile shows, usually with sharpie pen in hand, asking for my autograph on the original CD. This has become one of Yarlung’s iconic recordings, an “out of the ballpark” home run because it combines lifelike sound with hair raising, inspired performances. The 3D presentation, the “you are there” tonality and perfect acoustic decay in Zipper Hall where this was recorded, reveal three living breathing musicians playing just for us; it doesn’t get any better than this.

I remember the early days, before Yarlung had the state of the art SonoruS tape recorders they use now. Bob used a creaky old Revox A700 transport with customized electronics, stuck under a homemade styrofoam box to keep the reels quiet on stage. I guess the styrofoam worked! Once Yarlung releases this music on vinyl I will get out a fresh sharpie for those autographs.

–Steve Hoffman

Beethoven’s Trios — he wrote four in all — are early works, but already in the C Minor work on this LP the tread of the dramatic master is apparent. Just the opening, a dark, menacing melody that shows up again in the great Opus 131 Quartet of many years later, tells us that. C Minor was Beethoven’s most dramatic tonality throughout his lifetime; even though this early trio tends to slither into happier C Major tones rather readily, the dark shadows are never completely out of earshot.

–Alan Rich

Janaki String Trio “won the Coleman Chamber Music Competition and the Concert Artists Guild International Competition.” And writing about Janaki’s Carnegie debut, Allan Kozinn wrote the Janaki musicians were “fresh and energetic in Beethoven’s Trio”

–Allan Kozinn, New York Times

I love strings. I especially love the cello. I play it a little. Hearing Arnold and his mastery over this magnificent Tononi makes me especially happy. I hope you enjoy Serena, Katie and Arnold as much as Haydee and I do.

–Carlos Mollura, executive producer of Young Beethoven

This music sounds fresh and energizing just as it must have for Beethoven and his first lucky audiences.  We dedicate this pressing to our friends at the Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society. Society president Mike Wechsberg and chairman Bob Levi asked that we brand this release with the society logo, an honor we appreciate enormously. Thank you to our friends at LAOCAS for your generous listening support and encouragement.

–Bob Attiyeh, producer

Janaki String Trio:

Serena McKinney, violin
Katie Kadarauch, viola
Arnold Choi, cello

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