>Its title might conjure up jazz reworkings, but this second ‘Prokofiev Milestones’ continues the favourable impression of its predecessor (3/24) in surveying his output for violin and piano.

Lana Trotovšek and Maria Canyigueral are a perceptive duo, nowhere more so than with the powerful First Sonata. Their seriousness of purpose is evident from the opening Andante, its brooding intensity carried into a combative if never hectoring scherzo, the yearning of whose second theme is transmuted into a slow movement of improvisatory eloquence, while the finale pursues an impulsive course before coming full circle in a mood less cathartic than warily resigned. The Solo Violin Sonata could not be more different, its conception for non-specialist students evident from an absence of overt virtuosity or trenchant liveliness of outer movements that frame five brief variations unfolding in Prokofiev’s most disarming manner.

The rest consists of transcriptions, by the composer himself of the wordless Five Melodies for soprano-cum-pianist Nina Koshetz that make appealing encores. As are Mikhail Fichtenholz’s idiomatic renderings of five pieces from Cinderella, the sweeping opulence of ‘Grand Waltz’ and the insinuating elegance of ‘The Winter Fairy’ its highlights. A limpid reading of Nathan Milstein’s arrangement of the Andantino from The Tales of an Old Grandmother and resolute take on Jascha Heifetz’s of the March from The Love for Three Oranges complete the programme.

Choice in this music is now considerable. Gidon Kremer and Martha Argerich offer readings of the highest voltage, with the incisive searching of James Ehnes and Andrew Armstrong or animated verve of Alina Ibragimova and Steven Osborne among the pick from recent options. Those having invested in the earlier volume by this duo, however, need not hesitate; not least with sound of such clarity and definition, and authoritative notes by Robert Matthew-Walker.