For Beethoven, chamber music was an ex­ ceptional testing ground: in the piano so­ natas, in the string quartets and in the trios he looked for new technical-instrumental solutions, he extended the boundaries ofthe form and he tried unusual combinations of timbre. He then made the best of this ex­ perience in big orchestra! works, with un­ equalled results. At Mozart e Haydn times, the highest mas­ ters ofthe "classica! style", in the trio, very popular genre among Viennese middle­ class, the keyboard instrument was the undoubted protagonist, while the violin stood out in the sung episodes, and the celio played a more subordinate role, almost al­ ways doubling the bass line. Little by little Beethoven got rid of that model, formulating a composition which could guarantee the three "actors" a more similar role. The trio op.70 n.1 opens and closes with two movements (I and III) in a bright and determined manner, where the instrumental virtuosity and the freshness of the themes prevail. The Allegro and the Presto are like a shell, hiding their secret at the centre, the Largo assai ed espressivo, which is the main heart ofthe trio. We immediately understand the subtitle "Ghost" which amplified the success of this piece: the strings whisper fragments of a melody which develops on the arpeggio in D minor, while the piano intervenes with melancholic incisions. The second theme is more expressive and is first entrusted to the cello, then to the violin, in a desperate crescendo, leading it back to the first theme, with the cello accompanied by a moumful tremor ofthe piano. The piece develops slowly, maintaining a tension giv­ en by the unconventional treatment of the dynamic and of the harmonies, blooming sometimes in lyrical and dramatic parenthe­ ses. It is revolutionary music, which crosses the formai and expressive boundarìes ofthe epoch. The trio op. 97, composed in 181 I, was published in 1816 dedicated to the Arch­ duke Rodolfo of Austria, friend and sup­ porter, praised even in the name of the so­ nata "Hammerklavier" and of the Solemn Mass. Beethoven develops the research of new technical and expressive means, parallel to the development of keyboard instruments produced by Broadwood and other compa­ nies, which at the beginning ofthe 19th cen­ tury produced pianos with more solid mechanical parts, with a stronger sound and an extension of six octaves: necessary condi­ tions to imagine music of a stronger impact and duration. As a result, the proportions of this trio are symphonic; Beethoven tries to overstep every kind of genre and opens new paths which enlighted the way to Schubert and Brahms after him. The Allegro moderato is a piece with a wide scope: the first theme, aìry and singable is entrusted to the piano but is violently inter­ rupted by the introduction ofthe strìngs and the cadence of the celio. The second theme is instead in G major, the detached and hesi­ tating movement that sounds like the incipit of the Fourth piano concerto. The contrast between noble lyricism and the more rhyth­ mic and syncopated sections characterizes the whole trio. The Scherzo has a dancing character, even though it has with a centrai section with a religious fugato, opened with a mezza voce on the celio, and followed by a crescendo that flows into the rugged arpeggi ofthe pi­ ano and the sound offanfare ofthe strings. The slow movement is perhaps the most sublime piece of the trio: an Andante can­ tabile ma pero' con moto structured as a theme with five variations. A bright choral in D major is first presented by the piano then by the strings, but at the beginning of the first variation it remains just a memory, an evocation suggested by the extremely light accompaniment of the piano and the increasingly more articulate interventions ofthe strings. The last variation is a sort of recapitulation: the theme reappears, once more recogniz­ able, in pianissimo, before the finally pas­ sionate chant of the strings, stressed by the "Schubertian" chords of the piano, leads us to a more peaceful conclusion. The final Allegro moderato begins without any interruption: the character is rustic, al­ most sneering and the warm and comforting sonority of the Andante cantabile is only a memory. The motif is announced by the piano and made sharper by the trills, acciaccaturas and syncopated rhythms. It is a lively Ronda' in a classica! form, but in the finale a disrespectful tarantella in A major (a very distant key) insinuates in pianissimo and grows bolder step by step, until the conclusive pleading in tempo Piu' presto, that leads back to the "right" tonic of B flat major.