Much as I admire Steven Osborne (he was even able to persuade me of the merits of Britten’s Piano Concerto), I can’t help feeling that Beethoven is his Achilles heel for, surprisingly for this usually daring musician, the air of reverence that permeates proceedings here too often translates into safety and caution. There is the familiar pellucid tone, the thoughtful and clear phrasing, but this is lightweight Beethoven lacking fire in the belly. Along the way, Osborne offers some lovely touches like underpinning the second subject of the Pathétique’s first movement by subtly emphasising the bass semibreves under the right hand’s bass-to-treble dialogue, and the little G major Sonata, Op 79, is neatly turned; no one could deny his charm in the Moonlight’s Allegretto. But the outer movements of the Waldstein and the Moonlight’s Presto agitato finale are too polite and studio-bound by half. You can argue that Ronald Brautigam overcooks these but, on his revelatory fortepiano cycle for BIS, puts you closer in touch with Beethoven’s genius.

Martin Roscoe, on the first volume of his sonata cycle (it will be the first complete recording of Barry Cooper’s new ABRSM edition), brings a more rugged approach to the Pathétique. Compare the chromatic run at the end of the opening Grave: Osborne sees it as the conclusion of the introduction, Roscoe as a springboard into the Allegro molto con brio. Preceding this are the three Op 10 Sonatas. Beethoven has not quite shaken off Haydn and Mozart and yet, in the wonderful slow movements of Nos 1 and 3, has moved light years away. Coloured perhaps by a personal fondness for Op 10, I think Roscoe’s way with them is nigh-on perfect, lightly pedalled, full of a youthful vitality and impudence as though the ink was still wet on the paper. But I urge you especially to hear his handling of the C minor Sonata’s Adagio, a heartbreaking cry of regret that only a refined pianist with the wisdom of experience could bring off quite as well as this. Recorded with drawing-room intimacy at Potton Hall, I look forward eagerly to further volumes.