The music featured here is a tale of extremes, with the piano trios still relatively under-recorded, while the Quintet and Quartet are among Schumann’s most popular pieces. For these, Trio Wanderer are joined by viola player Christophe Gaugué and violinist Catherine Montier, with whom they previously recorded Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet (A/20).

Spirit and energy are features of the music-making here, whether in the outer movements of the Piano Quintet or the Allegro of the Quartet. And there’s also an inherent classicism compared to some accounts, allowing the ripe beauty of Schumann’s melodic lines to speak for itself rather than risking overstating matters. The downside of this can be a tendency to underplay some of the poetry – the interplay between cello and the other strings in the first movement of the Quintet, for instance (from 3'30"), is less telling than some and the desolate tread of the slow movement is more convincing in the hands of Alexander Melnikov and the Jerusalem Quartet. The Takács and Marc-André Hamelin also offer a more soulful reading here, while their high spirits in the Scherzo are irresistible.

There are similar caveats in the Piano Quartet, and the Wanderer don’t rival the Jerusalem and Melnikov in the balance of introspection and anticipation in its slow introduction. If Argerich and co are unassailable in the Scherzo, flying over the bar lines with ease, in the slow movement I wanted the Wanderer and friends to let themselves go a little more in the devastatingly beautiful cello melody – as David Finckel does in his live account with Daniel Hope. The finale is a tad businesslike too, with the moments of reverie passing for relatively little.

Turning to the trios, tempos are generally well chosen and the Wanderer are careful to ensure that in the faster movements the accentuation is buoyant and never allowed to weigh the rhythms down. However, some of the subtler colours pass for relatively little – such as the passage in the first movement of the Trio No 1 (from 5'15") where the strings play on the bridge over una corda piano chords, which is much more potent in the hands of Leif Ove Andsnes and the Tetzlaff siblings. If the Scherzo is altogether more effective, the true heart of this work lies in the slow movement, whose anguished songfulness is devastatingly realised by the period-instrument Melnikov/Faust/Queyras line-up.

They seem better suited to the high spirits of the Second Trio, with its rumbustious outer movements balanced by a rapturously duetting slow movement and a nice ease to the Intermezzo, with its canon between piano and strings.

In the Third Trio the surging rhythms that power the opening movement forwards are nicely judged, but the pizzicato cello theme that emerges out of the development (from 5'27") is less characterful than in either the Andsnes or Melnikov recordings and the Tetzlaffs offer a more haloed string sound in the slow movement. But the gnawing unease of the Scherzo is well conveyed by the Wanderer and the upwards-thrusting lines of the finale avoid being overly muscly.

If the Op 88 Fantasiestücke’s opening Romanze is a tad self-conscious compared to Andsnes and co, who are also superb in the third piece, there’s a nice wit to the Humoreske and the final number goes with verve, the Wanderer bringing out its playful demeanour to good effect.