Clarinet and marimba make an odd couple. Their timbres are almost diametric opposites – one warm and creamy, the other cool and bone dry – and it’s because of these stark differences, perhaps, that they complement one another so well. What’s more curious, to my ears, is the stark contrast in performance style. Richard Stoltzman’s playing is quite free and ruminative. In his arrangement for solo clarinet of Bach’s Chromatic Fantasy, for example, he replaces the florid virtuosity of the original keyboard-writing with something far more introspective. Indeed, he seems to be searching every scale and ornamental flourish for its expressive possibilities. What’s lost in this lovingly detailed approach, unfortunately, is a sense of the music’s large-scale phraseology and architecture.

Mika Stoltzman plays her transcription of Bach’s Chaconne with greater rhythmic rigour than her husband, yet her interpretation feels similarly contemplative, and her delicate touch brings an unexpected and touching fragility to this monumental work. Of course, the Chaconne lacks the improvisatory flair of the Fantasy; but even in the Fugue – where the two play together, joined by a bandoneón (another unlikely yet compatible partner) – she seems to be the one steering the steady course.

In Piazzolla’s Fuga y misterio (from the tango opera María de Buenos Aires), Ms Stoltzman is a bit too straight, rhythmically speaking, despite the oddly relaxed tempo. This is urban music that requires urgency and at least a hint of menace. Also, given that the Bach and Piazzolla arrangements are textually faithful to the originals, I was surprised that their version of Ravel’s Pavane is not and sounds more like a loosely impressionistic jazz improvisation.

Aside from the Chaconne, the most compelling performances are of William Thomas McKinley’s charming Mostly Blues miniatures and John Zorn’s Palimpsest. These works were written for the Stoltzmans, and both composers capitalise effectively on the instruments’ – and the performers’ – differences.