Has there ever been a composer who, with a simple song (or set of them), communicated the sheer joy of existence better than Martinů; that deep-seated sense of heart-bursting exhilaration, felt with every intake of breath, at simply being alive? The five brief Moravian folk songs that comprise The Primrose (1954) encapsulate this feeling absolutely, delicate yet full of life. The Jitro Czech Girls Choir’s bright tone matches the songs’ apparent naïvété remarkably well, yet they catch the songs’ slightly double-edged character, too, superbly accompanied by Zdeněk Häckl and Michal Chrobák.

The testing programme includes 15 such short songs, grouped into three sets, along with the charming stand-alone Ptačí hody (‘The Birds’ Feast’, 1959) with its accompanying trumpet, a minor gem of the composer’s last year. Two sets are unaccompanied: Songs for a Children’s Choir, also from 1959, superbly weighted music for younger singers, and the earlier Czech Nursery Rhymes, six subtler, expressively more ambiguous settings from 1931 (the year he started composing palíček). None of these tracks exceeds three minutes, the choir catching their tiny self-contained worlds with flawless intonation and ensemble, a tribute to Jiří Skopal’s excellent direction. When we come to the concluding 21-minute cantata The Opening of the Wells (as it is usually translated, rather than, as here, The Opening of the Springs), the choir prove their musicianship over a much longer time frame, as part of a broader ensemble. The first and best-loved panel of Songs from the Czech Highlands (1955-59, four settings of folk-inspired poems by Miroslav Bureš), The Opening of the Wells is just a joy to listen to, a wonderful synthesis of the simplicity of folk song with a larger, semi-dramatic canvas. I spent two days listening to this wonderful disc and the broadest of smiles never left my face. I didn’t mind the absence of full texts.