CONTEXT chamber-music ensemble opens its 19th season with a Houston First: The Complete Sonatas for Cello and Piano by Johannes Brahms performed on period instruments. The concert will feature the elegant French cellist Jean-Michel Fonteneau playing a Francesco Goffriller cello with gut strings and pianist Brian Connelly on a Bösendorfer piano from Brahms' time.

The two sonatas were written more than 20 years apart and reveal Brahms' stylistic evolution — from the young composer's brilliant synthesis of Baroque, Classical and Romantic idioms to the later master's intensely concentrated lyricism. The concert will include short works by Brahms' lifelong friends, including Heinrich and Elisabeth von Herzogenberg.