Beethoven’s Septet of 1799-1800 was one of his early successes, leading to a number of arrangements for more manageable forces. Beethoven himself made a version for clarinet, cello and piano. It shouldn’t work; but the clarinet is so prominent in the original scoring and the cello can so persuasively adopt the bassoon part that it is perhaps surprisingly successful. The piano takes the string parts, including the occasionally virtuoso first violin line.

The losses are actually rather small, given the piano’s ability to fill in the middle voices. Perhaps it is only in the horn-led Scherzo that the arrangement can’t approach the joyous ‘honkiness’ of the original but, taken on its own terms, Op 38 is a fine representation of the original. This French-Peruvian/Uruguayan trio make no apologies for its knock-off status and turn in a performance that holds the attention throughout. Played with such commitment, the listener is barely given the opportunity to remember how much richer the work sounds in its Septet original, which is surely the mark of a fine performance.

The Gassenhauer is often performed as a standard piano trio but is presented here in its original scoring and benefits from it, whether in the clarinet’s cry for attention at the opening, the cantabile cello solo of the central slow movement or the playful give-and-take of the closing variations that give the work its name. (The theme, from a comic opera by Joseph Weigl, was so popular that it was often heard whistled and sung in the lanes – Gasse – of Vienna.) Beethoven in determinedly popular mode is always a happy listen and the palpable enjoyment of these players make this a really pleasurable disc.