The early group of seven Toccatas has long been the domain of the virtuoso harpsichordist keen to engage with Bach’s relatively self-conscious essays – certainly in comparison with the more formalised suites – in how rhetorical fantasy and fugue can coexist in a modern instrumental style. From the outset, Christophe Rousset takes a classically measured view with his rigorous clarity of articulation and considered structural shape. Such an approach brings striking cohesion to the patchwork quilt of the opening D minor Toccata and, where the stakes are higher, in the elevated ambitions of the most famous of the works, the D major (Samuil Feinberg’s 1961 recording is still something of a benchmark for expressive possibility).

Rousset projects character through calculated contrast and a studious, even didactic manner in the fugal sections. It’s never less than impressive but there is a noticeable lack of depth, both in the overall sound and in identifying where Bach toys with his forebears’ poetic instincts alongside the rough and tumble of the stylus phantasticus. I yearned for Blandine Rannou’s reflective warmth in the slow sections, admittedly helped by a gloriously resonant harpsichord (ZZT, 4/12), and the youthful nobility and variety in Amandine Savary’s infectious readings on the piano (Muso). With Rannou, the single lines – which could almost at times be conceived as solo string music – present an austerity and loneliness that form part of these little universes, and yet her fugues are also discerningly muscular and luxuriant when required.

There are occasions when Rousset’s refinement and balance are especially telling, even beyond compare; the E minor and G minor pieces are especially successful, as well as the celebratory organ-like roulades of the G major. His contribution to the argument of what these pieces constitute is unquestionable and some will find his objective authority just the ticket. These are, though, unusually immersive works for the listener, as well as the player, and with Rousset one is too often left as a slightly distant observer, however admiring of his evident command and deep care.