Jill Crossland’s recording of The Well-Tempered Clavier Book 2 largely mirrors the virtues and drawbacks characterising her efforts in Book 1 (5/08). At its best, Crossland’s Bach is intimately scaled and sensitively nuanced, abetted by engineering that reproduces her dulcet sonority in the loveliest light. The C sharp and A flat major Preludes particularly illustrate her subtle ear for tone colour, while she shapes the G major Prelude’s rotary sequences with uncommon melodic emphasis.

However, Crossland does not consistently sustain the character and profile with which she commences a piece all the way through to the end. In other words, she goes on “cruise control”, where the basic tempi tend to slow down as her phrasing turns more generalised and four-square. This usually occurs when she grants ornaments a smidgen of wiggle-room, or when she regroups her hands following an unusually dense passage (the G minor Fugue’s close, difficult-to-untangle voice-leading), or increases her volume. For instance, the perky staccatos that energetically usher in the C minor Prelude soon lapse into a complacent, down-beat dominated groove, while the E flat Prelude’s initial flow and grace flattens out about halfway into the performance. For this reason I prefer the stronger, more seasoned Bach pianism of Hewitt, Schiff and Koroliov. Still, there’s something to be said for Crossland’s sound stylistic instincts and gentle demeanour.