The Duo Presti-Lagoya, comprising Ida Presti and Alexandre Lagoya, was one of the most influential and celebrated guitar duos of the 20th century. Active from 1952 until Presti’s premature death in 1967, Presti-Lagoya were passionate advocates for their chosen vehicle of expression, their artistry and technical prowess revolutionising the genre. Their legacy includes many fine recordings, the new music they commissioned and the numerous transcriptions they made.

This latest release from another superb guitar duo, Mark Eden and Chris Stell, is a fitting homage to Ida Presti. It includes works written or arranged by or for Presti-Lagoya; there is also one written in her memory, as well as another arranged by Eden Stell and a new work written for the latter duo by Johannes Möller – thus continuing Presti-Lagoya’s desire to enrich the repertoire.

Inspired by Karin Boye’s poem about the pain of growth and change, Möller’s ‘… when buds are breaking’ blends Eastern and Western musical elements. Like the poem’s metaphors of breaking buds and falling drops, the guitars initially clash but gradually find unity, contrasting sections and a range of techniques and tunings reflecting the poem’s themes of transformation and trust in the process of creation. Eden and Stell relish Möller’s accessible yet complex writing, their singing tones and ability to colour a note, phrase or paragraph with equal nuance and intensity matched by a near-telepathic sense of independence and ensemble.

This is preceded by Presti’s tuneful Étude fantasque, Jolivet’s weightier Sérénade pour deux guitares, Daniel-Lesur’s lyrical Élégie and Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s moving Fuga elegiaca – To the Memory of Ida Presti. These Eden and Stell dispatch with immense feeling and even a certain reverence. But in both the conception and the execution, it’s Chris Stell’s fine arrangement of Bach’s Concerto in D minor, BWV974 (after Alessandro Marcello), that perhaps brings us closer to the true spirit of the Presti-Lagoya project – the earlier duo’s sheer taste, ambition and style.