We could do a lot worse in the Beethoven year than listen more to his songs. Too easily overlooked, they represent a fascinating glimpse into an intimate side of their composer. Almost naive, and often movingly gentle, they show a Beethoven treading carefully in a nascent genre – we’re worlds away from the fist-shaking Promethean of the Romantic imagination, tearing up the rule book for the symphony and sonata.

Nevertheless, Beethoven still managed to innovate here, and is usually credited with writing the first song-cycle with his An die ferne Geliebte. This new recording from Ian Bostridge and Antonio Pappano is the third major account to be released this year, following those by Matthias Goerne with Jan Lisiecki (DG, 4/20) and Roderick Williams with Iain Burnside (Chandos, 6/20), not to mention the version from a sweet-toned Robin Tritschler with Malcolm Martineau, released late last year (Signum, 1/20).

Each of these recordings makes for fascinating listening, with this newcomer fusing Bostridge’s detailed, borderline fussy manner with Pappano’s sprightly playing, buoyant and delicate. One misses limpidness in Bostridge’s tone, admittedly, but he makes the songs his own in a performance that is never less than engaging and, as usual, conveys an unflinching and persuasive belief in the material.

He and Pappano are terrific in the ‘Song of the Flea’ and offer what feels like a fascinating glimpse into the composer’s workshop with his four ‘Sehnsucht’ settings, presented consecutively. There are more mellifluous accounts of ‘Adelaide’ and ‘Ich liebe dich’ out there, but in those and in a suitably intense ‘In questa tomba oscura’, the performances are nevertheless persuasive.

The folk-song arrangements are a little more problematic, with Bostridge sounding strangely unnatural with the language, failing to capture the necessary artlessness in the jollier songs, despite some lively tempos and superbly pointed playing from Vilde Frang and Nicolas Altstaedt – starry casting indeed. He’s better in the more melancholy numbers, such as the moving ‘Return to Ulster’ (although he sings Scott’s first three verses here, not the exact text as printed in the booklet).

In sum, though it doesn’t necessarily include first-choice recordings for any of these songs, this is a valuable and persuasive album from this high-profile duo.