Virtuosity serving profundity? An unlikely concept perhaps but it happens here. Sample the fifth movement, Presto, of Op 131 and the refined bravura of fleet-footed, mostly quiet playing will whirl the senses. The explosions of forte or fortissimo simply slip into their places as required. No one shouts, or out-shouts a colleague. Jump back to the fourth movement, where in this “still centre” (Basil Lam) of seven variations Beethoven ups the emotional ante. The theme played softly and sweetly as marked sets the scene. Critical notes are leant on to shape every phrase; a delicate tracery of tone from the first violin unwraps the second variation; and the sotto voce “hymning” of the sixth accentuates the contemplative that pervades much of this movement.

These musicians touch the ineffable in all slow movements bar the Cavatina of Op 130. Mystifyingly, they draw a dreamy veil across a movement that cost its composer many a tear, the bars in C flat marked Beklemmt barely acknowledged. For Peter Cropper of The Lindsays (ASV, 9/01) it meant “knotted up inside”; the sobs are palpable, the sadness collectively personalised to an uncommon degree. The Tokyo don’t feel the oppression. But why labour the point when, say, the Song of Thanksgiving of Op 132 floats above the ether, radiating a spiritual aura?

It’s the shared experience that tells – the dovetailing of the parts, of knowing when to blend or separate, when to assert or comply, all coming together in that tough test, the Grosse Fuge. The struggle isn’t fuelled by a sharp driving attack, as it is with the Takács, but the attack is still there. So is the drive, solidly imposing rather than frenetic. In sum, a lofty set establishing its own seal in the long odyssey that began in 1927 with the first integral recording of the Beethoven quartets by the Lener Quartet. What would they make of today’s interpretations and the sonic superiority of SACD so clearly heard here? What indeed.