As a body, the valedictory music of Johannes Brahms is the finest in history. The clarinet music may be better known, but the four sets of piano pieces are arguably more affecting, anodyne summations of a life well spent. Often performed in the 1930s and ’40s, these groupings are now rare in the concert hall, but pianist Richard Goode presented the “Seven Fantasies,” Op. 116, on Thursday evening at Carnegie Hall.

Mr. Goode has a personal style, and he applies it with ferrous consistency. His admirers describe his playing as seamless, elegant, marmoreal. Those less infatuated tend to use adjectives like pedantic, monochromatic, even dull. Alas, Richard Goode is all of these.

His declarative style is usually augmented by a prodigious technique, yet these Brahms pieces were haunted not by major gaffes, but rather an accumulation of frustrating miscues. The first Capriccio in D minor featured overpedaling of the left hand opening and uncharacteristic inaccuracy in the right. The Intermezzo in A minor contained phrasing that could charitably be described as idiosyncratic — it was as if Lorin Maazel had taken a turn at the keyboard. The Capriccio in G minor, normally notable for its dramatic opening, commenced instead in the most relaxed of manners and never exhibited any significant dynamic contrast. Mr. Goode does not seem to have an appreciation for light and shadow.

The Intermezzo in E minor was plagued by an inattention to detail and some good old-fashioned fat fingering. Mr. Goode’s attacks are better than his decays, with notes lingering just a tad too long and creating unwanted dissonances. The second Capriccio in D Minor — the work as a whole opens and closes in the same key — hovered dangerously close to the indistinct.

Mr. Goode fared better in Book Two of the Preludes by Claude Debussy. He created, if not a gossamer universe, at least a suitably murky one. Feuilles mortes (dead leaves) achieved almost — almost — poetic status. Still, his maddening uniformity of touch never reached the level where the listener would be amazed to find that the piano actually had hammers inside of it. All was ultimately competent, but not transforming.

Mozart’s Rondo in A minor was very well done, with the Classical weltanschauung more suited to this artist’s particular notion of clarity, but the Partita No. 5 of J. S. Bach was a disappointment. This G major delight is the sunniest of the six partitas, full of joie de vivre and rhythmic drive. Mr. Goode’s somewhat analytical approach, however, would have been much more effective with a soupcon of accent. Without a sense of chiaroscuro it was just Euclidian geometry.

The early Russian filmmaker Lev Kuleshov tried an experiment in editing. Instructing heartthrob Ivan Mozzhukhin to stare into the camera with as expressionless a face as possible, Kuleshov then alternated his image with that of a beautiful woman, a coffin, and a bowl of soup. The critics — then as now a gullible lot — praised the actor for his cornucopia of facial expressions subtly invoking lust, grief, and hunger. The art of Richard Goode is like that. He presents the music with no emotional embellishments; It is up to the listener to supply the underlying aesthetic content.

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The Beaux Arts Trio, the current iteration of which performed Friday evening at the Metropolitan Museum, has a rich history and a loyal following. In existence for more than 50 years, the group is best known as consisting of Menahem Pressler, piano, Isadore Cohen, violin, and Bernard Greenhouse, cellist. Mr. Cohen was not an original member but played with them for so long that few remember his predecessor, Daniel Guilet. Like the Guarneri Quartet, the trio has long anchored the chamber music series at the Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium.

Unlike the quartet, however, the Beaux Arts has been busy reinventing itself. Mr. Greenhouse left in the 1980s and Mr. Cohen in the ’90s. Mr. Pressler then formed a new group with the vibrant Young Uck Kim as the violinist and the Brazilian Antonio Meneses the cellist. Just as they were settling in, Mr. Kim suffered a debilitating injury and was replaced by Briton Daniel Hope in 2002.

But there were problems. The blending never seemed to jell, as Mr. Meneses sounded underpowered in many performances. Mr. Pressler, well into his 80s, went through a period during which his accuracy was spotty, sometimes strikingly so. It is pleasing to report then, that everything went smoothly this weekend.

The program featured no curtain raiser, no rarity, no obligatory contemporary regurgitation, just two of the towering works of the trio literature. Antonin Dvorÿák had used the Ukrainian dumka form — originally a folk-song lamentation in a slightly askew rhythm — several times before he penned his masterful “Dumky” Trio in E minor. The resultant work contains six distinct dances that progress from slow and gentle to wild and furious. The Beaux Arts presented them in a very original manner.

Immediately noticeable was the soft volume of the group. Is this a response to Mr. Meneses and his more refined tone? Either way, playing these normally raucous pieces at a whisper proved quite arresting. Furthermore, the group played the half-dozen without significant pauses, creating the illusion that this was one orgiastic, frenzied night of swirling and stumbling rural pantheistic ritual.

The opening is for strings alone, and both younger players were at the top of their game, perfectly in sync and nicely balanced. Mr. Pressler had a fine night, worry-free and rhythmically subtle. He has always had an intelligent sense of touch and can be quite poetic at times. Although it took some adjustment, for this listener at least, to accept this quiet reading, the overall beauty of execution eventually won me over. It was as if the trio was merely suggesting these dances rather than actually playing them. As a recollection in tranquility, this was interesting music making.

Had the group stopped here, the concert would have been short, but satisfying. As it turned out, reaching for the stars may have been a bit ambitious, as the trio came back from intermission with the granddaddy of all trios, the “Archduke” of Beethoven. Only the two Schubert works in the form can rival this amazing piece, so deeply exploring the nature of grandeur. For an exceptional performance, the players must have not only a bardic ability to weave a singing line, but also an orator’s sense of gravitas. The Beaux Arts redux did fairly well in the former, but had no meaningful acquaintance with the latter.

All could really be judged by the reading of the Andante cantabile, one of, or possibly the, greatest of all of Beethoven’s slow movements, the wellspring of the profundities of the late quartets. Again adopting the quiet approach, the trio tried valiantly to convey the Beethovenian humanity and struggle, but the overall sound was simply too thin. That tremendously affecting importuning by the strings toward the end of the movement — listen to the recording made by the three Chung siblings — which should leave the audience literally shaking was only declarative this night. The notes were there; the meaning was not. Additionally, the Scherzo was dexterous but rather prissy, the polar opposite of our conception of this Jovian composer.

Still, it was therapeutic to hear the Beaux Arts sound as polished as it did. It takes time, but the group seems to be back on the right path.