This was my first encounter with Albanian violinist Rudens Turku (who, according to the booklet, will be making his Carnegie Hall and Wigmore Hall debuts this coming season). Now in his early 30s, he fled to Germany at the age of 14 and studied at the Munich Academy under Ana Chumachenko (whose protégées include Julia Fischer, Arabella Steinbacher and Lisa Batiashvili). He’s an assertive, enviably articulate and formidably secure player, though the up-front balance does little to flatter his tone.

Turku and his stylish partner Oliver Schnyder display a fiery zeal, seriousness of purpose and clear-headed intelligence eminently well suited to the darkest and most broodingly passionate of Grieg’s three sonatas, though it’s hard not to feel they might have afforded to relax a touch more (the radiant outer portions of the slow movement don’t really smile as they can). Likewise, in the adorable Dvorák Sonatina there isn’t the heart-warming ease of expression, nostalgic glow and tumbling fantasy of the finest accounts; it’s all too relentlessly earnest for my own tastes. By contrast, Jack Liebeck’s altogether more subtly inflected and engaging version with the excellent Katya Apekisheva (Sony, 11/09) really does lift the spirits from the word go.

I feel much the same way about the three smaller items and, as I’ve already intimated, the bold and beefy recording does tend to fatigue the ear – I’d have welcomed a touch more airy bloom within what sounds like a helpfully ample acoustic.