Mere weeks after the Doric’s Op 41 comes another new set of Schumann’s miraculous quartets, this time coupled with the Piano Quintet. The Gringolts Quartet is a relatively new phenomenon, having formed in 2008. These four fine players are consistently musical in their approach and there is nothing outlandish or suspect about their interpretations. And therein perhaps lies their weakness, for it’s precisely that degree of risk-taking that makes this music come alive. It’s a risky strategy of course, but it’s there in abundance in both the Doric’s and the Zehetmair’s readings, and that’s what makes them so convincing. The Gringolts Quartet are less extreme – their slow movements faster, their fast ones steadier. It means that a movement such as the Scherzo of No 1 is heavier, with Mendelssohn – such a potent point of reference in the Doric’s reading – here banished; the coda to the finale of No 2, while still exciting, doesn’t have that edge-of-madness to it that you find in the Doric. There’s also more sense of four distinct personalities at work in the Doric, notably in moments such as the ravishing cello-violin duet in the Adagio of the First. There is elegance to the new reading, though, which can be persuasive, such as in the variation-form second movement of No 2, though the close recording has caught what sounds like intakes of breath, which may prove distracting for some listeners.

For the Quintet the Gringolts are joined by Peter Laul, who makes light of the fiendish piano-writing. They set off at a purposeful tempo and ironically it’s here that you experience the quartet members showing more individuality. The fast movements generally come off best here – though in the Scherzo it’s hard to match the fingery brilliance of either Marc-André Hamelin or Leif Ove Andsnes; while Argerich leads a joyous dance in the finale, edging towards mania in her propulsion. It’s in the slow movement that doubts arise again with this new recording: momentum is in short supply, despite the fact that the players are less daringly slow than the Takács/Hamelin reading.