Palm Beach Daily News
By Michael O’Connor
The Chamber Music Society of Palm Beach opened its Great Performers Series on Wednesday evening with a superb performance by the Aletheia Piano Trio.
Violinist Francesca dePasquale, cellist Juliette Herlin and pianist Fei-Fei Dong formed their ensemble while students at the Juilliard School and advanced their skills at the Perlman Music Program. […] Their performance was everything one might expect from a very young group of remarkably talented musicians.
They seem to have a sense of what they want to do with a performance. Their name comes from the Greek word for sincerity and they certainly appeal to that quality on stage.
The ensemble began the concert with a G-major trio by Haydn. The Aletheia Trio performed this with charm and grace it deserved, while having fun with the more boisterous gypsy tunes of the finale.
Faure composed only one piano trio, and it was originally conceived with a clarinet in the lead role. Like many of his works, it quite sensuous with moments of exquisite charm, but his decision to retain the unison clarinet-cello lines in the second movement in the violin-cello version, made one wish for the contrasting timbre of the clarinet. The trio handled it marvelously, […]
The trio closed the program with Mendelssohn’s Op. 49 Trio in D Minor. This was a work that they honed at the Perlman Program, which was evident in the performance. They performed this work with the confidence and understanding of musicians beyond their years, which is a good sign of things to come for this outstanding ensemble.