Enescu wasn’t sure that his massive String Octet of 1900 was a chamber work at all. He was happy for it to be performed by larger forces, and when you listen to this recording from the Queen Elisabeth Music Chapel in Belgium, you can hear why. True, there are only eight players here; but such is the weight of their attack, the density of their ensemble sound and the upfront, extrovert nature of their interpretation that you might easily mistake them for a small orchestra – one that handles the massive climaxes and often jagged outbursts with a unity that might lead you to think they had a conductor.

Credit, then, to the group’s leader Edoardo Zosi for a performance which, if at times overbearing (I don’t say hectoring) in its directness, certainly gives you a sense of the Octet’s symphonic ambitions. The cellos, in particular, sing handsomely and the group’s command of ebb and flow – particularly in the long paragraphs that end the first and fourth movements – is imposing. But the recorded sound is boxy and drab, and what’s more, these players are going up against Vilde Frang’s superb 2018 account, which Rob Cowan found ‘absolutely stunning’.

The choice of coupling doesn’t really help, either: Mendelssohn’s Octet is an obvious pairing but it demands a very different approach. As performed here by a substantially different group of players, it’s big on energy and speed but fatally low on the intimacy, brilliance and sense of conversation that this glorious work demands. ‘Blunt’, ‘aggressive’ and ‘routine’ are not words that should ever spring to mind where Mendelssohn’s Octet is concerned. Unless the coupling appeals, you could do better elsewhere.