Vyacheslav Artyomov turned 80 this year. His reputation may rest significantly on large-scale orchestral works, such as the Requiem and his seven symphonies (so far), but he has written much instrumental and chamber music, very little of it in traditional combinations: hence quartets of flutes and saxophones rather than strings. Divine Art’s series of (mostly) reissued recordings has already included a number of these smaller-scale works, to which this 11th collection, remastered from the composer’s archive, of performances given between 1970 and 1991, adds enormously to our picture of his output.

To a degree, ‘chamber music’ is as inaccurate a description of these works as it is of Beethoven’s late quartets. This is genre-bursting creativity in which the number of performers is entirely incidental. This is exemplified by the atmospheric diptych Hymns of Sudden Wafts (1981-83), ostensibly a trio for saxophonist – playing soprano and tenor instruments – harpsichord and piano but feeling more like an orchestral score, especially in the 23-minute concluding Lento. The structurally and expressively complex Capriccio on the ’75 New Year Eve (1975), another trio, for two saxophones and percussion, is similarly big-boned; however, the two Litanies – respectively for quartets of saxophones (1977) and flutes (1981) – are more ‘intimate’. So, too, are the brief, virtuoso Solo Clarinet Sonata of 1966 and the aphoristic Armenian Duets of the same year, in which last the composer beautifully accompanied the Lisitsian sisters, ‘c1970’. Wonderfully played, sensationally restored, all of this music deserves to be much more widely known outside Russia. Heartily recommended.