This Trout must surely be one of the very best versions of this much-recorded work – the sound is wonderfully natural, and so is the performance.
You get the impression that here was an occasion when everything 'clicked', giving the playing a friendly, relaxed feeling that's just right for this carefree piece. Zacharias has the knack of making even the simplest phrase sound expressive, and the strings, without any exaggeration, produce the most beautiful tonal shadings.
All five players, too, have an impressive sense of line; the phrasing and points of emphasis are balanced so that Schubert's expansive designs are projected compellingly. If the Trout shows a Schubertian spaciousness, his one completed String Trio is unusually compact.
Another distinguished feature is the florid, Spohr-like elegance of much of the violin writing – Andreas Seidel is splendidly stylish and confident. This is another very fine performance, emphasising the predominating gentle lyricism, but with plenty of vigour and panache when required. The String Trio fragment, less than two minutes, continues the same, 'let's hear everything' approach; it's a sketch for what subsequently became the comparatively familiar B flat Quartet, D112.