A musical trio denotes a group of three solo instruments or voices. The most common instrumental types are drawn from the same family (i.e., woodwinds, strings or brass) or two from the same family (usually violin and cello) with piano, where it is known as the piano trio. For my Trio I decided to use a mixed ensemble consisting of flute, clarinet and viola.
The first movement, "Rowing on a lake," is a leisurely barcarolle. The basic feature of a barcarolle is a lilting rhythm depicting the movement of a boat.
The second movement, "Morning fog on a glass lake," is a slow, serene depiction of the stillness, reflections and blurred images one might experience under those conditions. To represent stillness and reflection (inversion) I employed the perfect intervals (fourths and fifths) primarily in the viola part; to represent fog or blurriness I used their difference (seconds and sevenths) in the flute and clarinet parts; to represent motion and clarity I used their convolved difference (thirds and sixths).
The last movement, "Aksak's party," is a fast, rhythmic, mixed meter scherzo. The lop-sided nature of the 5/4 meter is due to the combination of the jazz waltz (3 quarter notes) and the galop (2 quarter notes). The name "Aksak", which literally means "limping," "stumbling," or "slumping" is derived from the Turkish aksak musical system in which pieces or sequences of rhythmic cells based on quantities of two and three are executed in a fast tempo.
As I was composing this movement I kept imagining Aksak as a Turkish chicken farmer who loves bluegrass fiddling and jazz but simply can't keep a steady beat. So, a variety of styles are presented especially "bluegrass" noticeable in the treatment of the viola with its double stops. In bluegrass, as in some forms of jazz, one or more instruments each takes its turn playing the melody and improvising around it, while the others perform accompaniment. This is especially typified in tunes called breakdowns which are often characterized by rapid tempos, unusual instrumental dexterity, and sometimes by complex chord changes.