To hear Handel’s complete first book of suites played on the piano is a comparative rarity (among the few available alternatives are versions by Dina Ugorskaja, Keith Jarrett, Peter Weiss and Ragna Schirmer, none of which I have heard). His keyboard music has never rivalled Bach’s in popularity and these suites, published in 1720, deserve to be far better known. The one movement that will be familiar to most is the Air and Variations from Suite No 5, the so-called ‘Harmonious Blacksmith’, paradoxically far from representative of the others which have more in common with Bach’s Suites, reflecting something of Handel’s German heritage and sharing the same ‘mixed goût’ developed by Georg Muffat – a synthesis of French dance, Italian elegance and ‘the profundity and learned art of the Germans’ (Charles Burney in his biography of Handel).

Despite initial misgivings, this is a truly delightful couple of discs from the Russo-Austrian Lisa Smirnova. She plays the Suites in an order of her own, starting with the fussily ornamented Adagio of Suite No 2. The piano is not as intimately placed as one might expect (very different from the close inspection given to Gavrilov in the D minor suite from Handel’s second collection – EMI) but the ear soon adjusts – gratefully, for the sound picture not only allows the illusion of a harpsichord when appropriate (try the Prelude to Suite No 1) but serves the clarity of rapid passagework extremely well (Suite No 3’s concluding Presto, for instance). Smirnova’s limpid touch and lucid tone are perfect partners for Handel and, with an excellent booklet, one can only look forward to Vol 2 with the 1727 collection in due course.