Comparing these two CDs has been an object lesson in contrasts, starting with the woman to whom Andrew Manze’s selection of sonatas was dedicated, Josepha Barbara Auernhammer, caricatured by Mozart as hefty, pushy, sweaty and scantily dressed. How different the elfin spectre of Hilary Hahn, whose playing is the very embodiment of elegance, tonally even and sweet, rather in the manner of the young Isaac Stern. The second contrast is between Hahn and Manze, different worlds entirely – Hahn and her piano partner Natalie Zhu offering us Mozart as one might have enjoyed him 20-30 years ago. Meaning that the accent is placed firmly on clarity and line, the playing style intense, immaculately turned and with little hint of the blustery attack and keen inflections that characterise the approach favoured by a later generation.

The Sonata K376 is the one programmed by both violinists. Manze opens with generously stated chords, his fortepianist Richard Egarr responding with a robustly clangorous allegro, the two of them thinking, breathing and phrasing very much ‘of a mind’ – quite a feat given that their interpretation is fairly free. Old-timers like me might take a second or two to adjust away from our Grumiauxs, Goldbergs, Shumskys, indeed our Hahns, and the like; but once into the Manze/Mozart mindset, all becomes clear – a manner of performance that is at once vigorous and laid back, unforced but forthright. Notable characteristics include a fortepiano whose sound darkens as it softens and a seemingly effortless fiddle-playing style that’s frequently (though by no means always) bereft of vibrato but with a finely drawn legato. The four sonatas progammed are all good pieces, the incomplete K403 a comparative rarity, contemporaneous with the others and opening like an amiable gavotte.

Put on Hahn’s K376 and the culture shock is striking – a taut opening chord, prim pianism, with brilliant runs from the soloist, otherwise a sweet, rather formal smile and very little in the way of expressive inflection. As violin playing per se, I can’t think of anyone alive who produces a more ravishing sound or controls their sound more skilfully. The opening of K301 is immediately arresting while the combination of expressive tone and calculated understatement especially suits the E minor Sonata, K304.

The one ingredient lacking, an ingredient that Manze and Egarr display in abundance, is imagination. The beauty is breathtaking but for me that’s more or less where things stop – there’s precious little light and shade or variety of nuance, no ‘speaking’ through the music. Sometimes beauty on its own just isn’t enough – whereas character can make up for a great deal.