Debussy’s extraordinary work used to be found in collections of chamber music by his contemporaries and immediate successors. Ravel, Guy Ropartz and Roussel provided the couplings in what remains perhaps its most famous recorded outing, on a disc featuring Richard Adeney (flute), Osian Ellis (harp) and Cecil Aronowitz (viola). Reviewing the LP in 1962, Gramophone dismissed the piece as ‘inconsequential’ – a reminder that critical opinion never stands still.

In another time and place, Armenian-American ECM regular Kim Kashkashian and her colleagues take the long view, placing the seminal Sonata for flute, viola and harp in the context of more recent compositions for identical forces. Debussy’s innovations are discussed in some detail in the elegant accompanying booklet. If that sounds challenging, the music is anything but. Indeed, while playing and production are exquisite throughout, you may find your attention wandering a little in the subtle and sophisticated companion pieces.

Takemitsu’s ethereal reflections are profoundly affected by the example of the French master. Gubaidulina’s 18 minute musical landscape, also cast in a single movement, has been recorded before but these players guarantee it a more permanent place in the lists. Some rate its fusion of East and West very highly indeed. Others, myself included, find its sonic explorations more than a little diffuse. It ends here with an optional spoken passage from the work of Viennese poet Francisco Tanzer, one half of the poetic background to a score inspired too by the Armenian balladeer celebrated in Parajanov’s film The Colour of Pomegranates.

At the core of this beautifully presented programme is a wonderfully keen-eared, uncommonly spacious account of Debussy’s Sonata for flute, viola and harp.