Riches indeed to have not one but two accounts of the Berg Concerto. James Ehnes and Christian Tetzlaff are unquestionably among today’s greatest violinists, and the fact that their approaches are so strongly contrasted demonstrates the myriad interpretative possibilities offered by this masterpiece.

On the Chandos album it’s the last item in a programme that has two of Andrew Davis’s own orchestrations, together with the Three Orchestral Pieces, Op 6. All these readings make a statement about where Davis stands interpretatively – he clearly views Berg as a late Romantic, exultantly clothing the Piano Sonata and the Passacaglia in layers of velvety colouring that, in the sonata in particular, lend it a new beauty, though it arguably short-changes the angst of the original. In all, the BBC Symphony are on fine form.

When it comes to the Violin Concerto, theirs is an unhurried reading, with James Ehnes sweet-toned and not afraid to linger in the opening bars, where violin and harp trade arpeggios from which Berg fashions his tone-row. Christian Tetzlaff, by comparison, with Robin Ticciati and the DSO Berlin, is more driven, more rasping of tone, but common to both is an ability to shape a narrative of compelling immediacy, allied to an extraordinary level of detail. As the Carinthian Ländler emerges (at the Allegretto, marked scherzando in the score – track 4, 4'25" in the Tetzlaff, track 6, 4'47" in the Ehnes), it’s relatively straight in the latter, more sultry and portamento-laden in the former. Both conductors ensure that the first movement’s mighty brass-laden climax is properly powerful, but as the music subsides it is Ticciati who offers a more shell-shocked setting for Tetzlaff’s musings, with a powerfully desolate-sounding triangle. Davis is altogether more cushioned, though there’s no mistaking the potency of Ehnes’s playing.

As we reach Part 2, if its terrifying, proto-Birtwistlian opening chords are too raw in the hands of Ticciati and Tetzlaff, then you might find the statelier Davis and Ehnes more to your taste. Or, come to that, the Gramophone Award-winning partnership of Zimmermann and Petrenko, who have the advantage of the colours of the Berlin Phil in their armoury. In the cadenza, in particular, Zimmermann is remarkable for his balance of passion and perfection of intonation, duetting ardently with solo viola.

The emergence of the Bach chorale at the long-awaited Adagio is another key moment within the piece. Tetzlaff’s colouring offers myriad shadings, Ehnes, slower, moulds the phrases with great eloquence, and as we reach Berg’s remarkable recolouring of the chorale with clarinets and saxophone, it acquires the religioso quality marked in the score most potently in the hands of the Berlin Phil and the Berlin DSO (though no one, to my mind, shapes this section quite as movingly as Abbado for Isabelle Faust). At the work’s close, Davis imbues the growly final chords below high-lying violin with a kind of voluptuousness, Ticciati altogether uneasier, in keeping with Tetzlaff’s questing, wandering spirit.

Tetzlaff’s disc-mate is a live account of the Brahms Concerto, and there’s a buoyant quality to Ticcati’s opening tutti, which is tenderly balanced by the lyrical second theme. When Tetzlaff finally makes his entrance there’s a wonderful elasticity to his phrasing, very much as we experienced in the Berg. Even when he’s accompanying, the sense that each phrase offers a new musical opportunity (without being overdone) is remarkable, as is the innate interplay between him and Ticciati. The slow movement flows easily, with the wind particularly characterful and Tetzlaff’s alto register a thing of beauty, and the finale flies without feeling in any way scrambled – Ticciati coaxing from his players a sense of whirring dance – while the joyously energised coda offers a real daredevilry between soloist and ensemble that is utterly infectious.

Carelessly, I’d missed Tetzlaff and Ticciati’s previous recordings of the Beethoven and Sibelius Concertos (10/19), so liked by Rob Cowan, but I’m off out shopping forthwith.