Important cello sonatas arrived in trickles until 1878, Steven Isserlis writes in his detailed and delightfully informative booklet note, the year Luise Adolpha Le Beau (1850-1927) completed her Sonata, Op 17. It was, he tells us, the initial splash in what was to become a relative ‘downpour’.

Le Beau’s compact and tuneful sonata has been recorded several times but never with anything like the exultant energy on display here. Isserlis pours his heart into the lilting slow movement, and he and Connie Shih seize every opportunity to ratchet up the drama – as at 2'41" in the opening Allegro molto. They bring a similar exuberance to Richard Strauss’s youthful Op 6, heard here in its rarely played original form (1881). If you only know the revised 1883 version – Isserlis recorded it with Stephen Hough (RCA, 9/01) – it’s worth hearing Strauss’s initial conception as it offers an entirely different slow movement and finale as well as a more elaborate cello part in the first movement. The Schubertian Larghetto is especially noteworthy, and particularly the delicate, almost other-worldly second theme (beginning at 2'17").

In between these sonatas we’re given Dvořák’s Four Romantic Pieces (1887), originally for two violins and viola but best known in the version for violin and piano. Isserlis isn’t the first cellist to adapt these glorious miniatures for his instrument but I find his account the most persuasive yet, particularly in the melodious sobbing of the final piece. Listen, say, to the vocal quality of his tone at 2'01", at 3'25" and again at the end. The effect is absolutely heart-rending.

The recital begins with a characterful account of Bruch’s Kol Nidrei. I love the sense of baroque splendour the musicians give to the fortissimo section (at 3'41", for example), and bringing in harpist Olivia Jageurs for the work’s final section (beginning at 5'17") is a small stroke of genius. Even in such well-worn music, I find Isserlis’s golden tone and seamless legato deeply stirring. He returns to this ancient Jewish prayer near the programme’s end in a much starker setting by Ernst David Wagner (1806-83), and then closes with Isaac Nathan’s musical setting of one of Byron’s Hebrew Melodies. If the melody of the latter sounds vaguely familiar, it’s with good reason, as Bruch borrowed it for the second half of his Kol Nidrei.

Everything about this release is a pleasure, from the refinement and intensity of the performances to the absolute perfection of the recorded sound. Don’t miss it.