I was excited to hear this programme, not least because the Fauré Impromptus get out far less often than they deserve. And there isn’t an unbeautiful note or inelegant phrase to be found anywhere in this recital by Ismaël Margain. His credentials impress: he studied at the Paris Conservatoire and subsequently won the Long-Thibaud competition. So far, so good …

Fauré’s First Impromptu, with which the album opens, has an easy flow to it, allied to that kind of fingery clarity associated with the French school of pianism. The fast-flowing Second sounds a tad timid, and that’s even before you compare him with earlier members of the French piano school: both Marguerite Long and Emma Boynet (APR, 5/21) are wonderfully airborne here (particularly Long in 1933, but even in 1957, when she was 82, she still impresses – APR, 6/22). Moving into modern times, Kathryn Stott also offers fleeter passagework than Margain. In the Third, too, Stott finds a greater richness in the middle section, though Margain’s way with the changing tempos is pleasingly natural-sounding. With Fauré’s Fourth Impromptu we reach the 20th century and this new account tends to underplay its ambiguities, while the remarkable Fifth (the latest piece in the set) could, with its whole-tone scales, almost be a Debussy Étude. Here it has an elegance that I find less telling than Long’s far more disturbing vision. The Sixth, originally for harp, sounds convincing enough on the piano but is not the most distinctive of the set.

The Chopin is also something of a mixed bag. The First Impromptu is a little cautious, particularly alongside Perahia’s fearless airiness. The Second works better, Margain managing its switch from F sharp major to menacing D major particularly well. The Third, while charming, seems to lack real pathos as it turns to the minor, and the tempo is a little on the slow side – a minute with Cortot (Warner) and you’re in a different world. In the Fantaisie-impromptu an alluring surface glitter doesn’t substitute for emotional depth. Margain’s Berceuse is elegant and swift-moving (and less interventionist than Chamayou – Erato, A/20), but no match for Pires at her haloed best (DG, 1/99). Two improvisations close the recital: Fauré’s is nicely shaped and subtly coloured, while the pianist’s own is a mash-up of the tracks on the disc to form a quietly reverential homage.