He may have been overshadowed (at least south of the border) by younger contemporary James MacMillan, but William Sweeney (b1950) has amassed a sizeable output, as diverse as it is uncompromising. His collaboration with cellist Robert Irvine is represented by three recent works, of which The Tree o’ Licht (2008) draws on a Scots poem by Hugh MacDiarmid and the tradition of Gaelic psalm-singing for an intensive duologue such as aptly evokes the nocturnal birdsong of the title. If The Poet Tells of His Fame (2003) promises a more rebarbative expression, this ‘electroacoustic fantasy after [Jorge Luis] Borges’ is never less than cohesive in the soloist’s interweaving of line, rhythm and texture with a pre-recorded backdrop that affords a luminous and subtly evolving harmonic context: a veritable tour de force for cellist and sound-monitor alike.

Much the longest piece here is the two-movement Cello Sonata (2010), the first movement of which plays out against the vestigial outline of a sonata form whose dynamic impulse is constantly yet productively held in check. The second movement unfolds as an intensifying series of verses, with the piano emerging belatedly to effect a strident climax before the music subsides into an elegiac postlude. Irvine has the full measure of the work’s intensely argued seriousness, and he is ably partnered here by Fali Pavri and elsewhere by Erkki Lahesmaa. The resonant acoustic of Glasgow University’s Concert Hall duly enhances the music-making, as does Eddie McGuire’s sympathetic booklet-note. It all adds up to an impressive release that is well worth investigating.