Recordings of Wolf songs are rare today, ones sung by tenors even rarer. Yet here, after the much-admired Werner Güra disc, comes one to delight the ear. Ian Bostridge’s choice of songs is typically fastidious, his interpretation of them full of the intelligence, understanding and musicality we expect from him.

With Antonio Pappano in wonderfully supportive, positive form, they rise to inspired heights in the central group of Mörike settings – “Im Frühling”, “Auf ein altes Bild”, “Gebet”, “An den Schlaf” and “An die Geliebte”. In these contrasting songs of religious insight and deep love, Bostridge performs with a kind of inward concentration and then elatory spirit, coupled with his rapt palpitating tone, that precisely matches with Wolf’s masterpieces. He is perhaps even better in the Goethe setting “Ganymed”, which can seldom if ever have received such a rapturous performance, and brings the recital to a satisfying close.

Against these wonders must be set songs where his syllabic emphasis and tendency to Sprechgesang lead to performances that sound mincing. I am thinking of “Begegnung”, “Nimmersatte Liebe” (grossly overdone) and, earlier among the Eichendorff songs, “Nachtzauber”. Here the wish to extract something from every word robs the songs of their natural flow, though among the Eichendorff settings, the over-familiar “Verschwiegene Liebe” receives an unfettered and restorative reading.

Güra by comparison is not always as imaginative as Bostridge, his style more that of traditional Lieder singers, but his straightforward singing and fuller tone are their own advocates. Bostridge, with Pappano an always inventive partner, makes you hear the songs – like it or not – anew. One may not always capitulate to the results, but Wolf is a composer who, above all, benefits from two artists willing to live dangerously. They are helped by John Fraser’s well balanced and full-bodied recording.