thumb|245x245px|[[Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky c. 1875]]
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Piano Trio in A minor, Op. 50, was written in Rome between December 1881 and late January 1882. It is subtitled [In memory of a great artist], in reference to Nikolai Rubinstein, his close friend and mentor, who had died on 23 March 1881. It is scored for piano, violin, and cello.
The work's first version was completed by late January 1882. The players at the performance were Sergei Taneyev (piano), Jan Hřímalý (violin), and Wilhelm Fitzenhagen (cello).</blockquote>
A year later, he composed the piano trio without being asked to do so, when any number of other genres or instrumental combinations were also available to him.
In a letter to von Meck of 27 December 1881, he again referred to his "antipathy for this combination of instruments". He wrote: "... in spite of this antipathy, I am thinking of experimenting with this sort of music, which so far I have not touched. I have already written the start of a trio. Whether I shall finish it and whether it will come out successfully I do not know, but I would like very much to bring what I have begun to a successful conclusion ... I won't hide from you the great effort of will required to set down my musical ideas in this new and unusual form. But I should like to overcome all these difficulties ...
He completed his rough sketches on 20 January 1882,
Martha Argerich, Gidon Kremer, and Mischa Maisky recorded a version that one critic called "music making on a cosmic scale...performances of shattering intensity, improvisational spontaneity, and Herculean grandeur."
Other uses
Music from the second movement was used for John Taras' 1948 ballet Designs with Strings.