Finding a Voice

An Intimate Performance of Chamber Music

How does an artist discover what is uniquely theirs?

‍Our identities are shaped by the people, places, traditions, and experiences that influence us. For composers, finding an individual voice can mean building upon those influences, discovering something unexpected, or evolving as life unfolds.

At just eighteen, Sergei Rachmaninoff composed his Trio élégiaque No. 1, already revealing the sweeping melodies and emotional intensity that would define his music. Dmitri Shostakovich was only sixteen when he began his Piano Trio No. 1, offering a glimpse of the composer he would become before the political and personal challenges that later shaped his artistic life. Arno Babajanian, drawing from both Armenian musical traditions and Russian Romanticism, brought these influences together in his Piano Trio in F-sharp minor to create something distinctly his own.

Together, these three works explore how artistic identities emerge, evolve, and take shape through the influences we carry with us. Perhaps finding a voice isn't about leaving those influences behind, but discovering what we can make of them.