Each issue of Ensemble MidtVest’s Gade series adds to the stylistic and taxonomical riddles surrounding the composer. While previous instalments have given us a mixture of complete and incomplete works, Gade’s Quintet in F minor of 1837 is neither. We don’t know if the single movement was meant to be the first of a number or to stand on its own. The easiest course of action is to nod along with annotator Finn Engeland Hansen’s conclusion that it’s surely a self contained piece: a glimpse of Gade the radical.

Formally, it might derive from the Mendelssohnian dramatic overture (Gade’s own overture Echoes from Ossian was his breakthrough work) and presents a picture of rhapsody as it devolves from forward argument into moments of idyll. It is beautifully played by Ensemble MidtVest’s strings. Once more, however, Gade’s most distinctive feature is his tendency to lathe themes that are more functional than inspired; they allow him to get the argument boiling but, paradoxically, can’t sustain the heights of passion that result.

F minor was obviously a favourite key as Gade’s only finished quartet (1851) uses it too. He all but disowned the score and therein might lie another narrative this cycle has thrown up: that Gade didn’t recognise when he was at his best from fear of falling foul of the Leipzig rulebook. This free-form work doesn’t satisfy the analytical eye as much as the musical ear but that counts in its favour. Expression wins (marginally) over Gade’s occasional thematic pedantry. The lack of a real slow movement shows how much he prioritised keeping his music moving, Mendelssohn-style.

The disc opens with the Novelettes for piano trio (1853 but revised later) and they are among Gade’s most charming works. The free-flowing Larghetto is a beauty but, this being Gade, all is not as it seems: he wrote and then discarded a sixth movement. Ensemble MidtVest include it here, if only to prove that Gade was right. The fifth closes the piece off thematically and with an unassuming ending that leaves an altogether sweeter taste in the mouth.