Elliott Carter has penned a number of short ‘tribute’ pieces over the past two decades; their pithy concentration of means is an excellent way into his mature music, as several previous collections testify. The present disc frames a varied and representative selection with two of Carter’s most trenchant chamber works. The Piano and Wind Quintet (1991) is perhaps his most direct treatment of instruments as character-types, in an instrumental drama as purposeful as it is inventive. Claire Désert is the incisive pianist in this well-coordinated account, which however misses some of the finer shades of characterisation evident in the Philips recording made soon after the world première. That disc also features the complete Trilogy, of which Inner Song forms the central panel. Maurice Bourgue is expressive here, but not nearly so concerned as Heinz Holliger to project an unbroken melodic line.

Patrick Gallois revels in the sharply contrasted gestures of Scrivo in vento and Michel Lethiec brings wit and wisdom to Gra. The ensemble pieces sound well in the spacious acoustic, and the performances are more characterful than those on ECM, though they lack impact compared to those on the vividly-recorded Bridge disc. With the Duo for violin and piano (1974), a passionate attraction of opposites, Gérard Poulet is hampered by what sounds like added reverberation. While this gives his account greater emotional warmth, it diffuses timbral and temperamental contrasts, so undermining the music’s cumulative intensity. This account cannot compete with the capricious flights of fancy effected by Irvine Arditti and Ursula Oppens, or the rhetorical but never overwrought grandeur of Robert Mann and Christopher Oldfather. The Bridge CD features Rolf Schulte’s incisive reading, and Fred Sherry in quite possibly the finest recording of the Cello Sonata. As a cross-section of Carter’s chamber music, the Bridge CD is highly desirable – compared to which, the new disc can only be given a qualified recommendation.