The Tcherepnin family is a musical dynasty that has given us several generations of composers. The music of the three composers featured here suffers from underexposure at present but deserves much better, so the Michelangelo Quartet are to be congratulated for this recording, which gathers together chamber pieces by Nikolay, Alexander and Ivan Tcherepnin – father, son and grandson. Nikolay belonged to Diaghilev’s circle in the middle of his career and became a kind of staff composer, someone who could be relied on to do a good job when stars were not available. Here he is represented by a piece from earlier in his career, the Second Quartet of 1902, composed when he was still under the influence of Rimsky-Korsakov and Glazunov. The performers give the piece a stylish and agreeable rendition but they might be faulted for over-caution – the music as it appears in the score seems a little too well behaved, and it would benefit from some risk-taking, with more rubato, more abandon in the folksy tunes and greater dynamic contrasts, to give this worthy journeyman piece some extra sparkle.

The Michelangelos seem to feel more at home when they come to Nikolay’s son, Alexander Tcherepnin, whom I find the most interesting of the three. His single-movement First Quartet may at first glance appear a little sketchy and stylistically unsure but all is explained when we realise that the piece is a reworking of a religious cantata. The connection is preserved in the quartet’s subtitle, ‘Love Offering to St Theresa of the Child Jesus’. Homing in on the archaic echoes in this music, the Michelangelos use vibrato economically and keep the work’s emotional temperature relatively cool.

In the Second Quartet and the Piano Quintet, there is much delightful music in the free spirit of the 1920s. Alexander was living in Paris, absorbing the latest modernist trends, before moving on to China, then Japan and finally the US. The Second Quartet is full of weird and wonderful inventions, such as the contrast in the slow movement between the whistling harmonics of the violins and the normal singing register of the viola and cello, or the finale’s quirky dance rhythms and pungent eight-note chords. The Piano Quintet is an exploration of the moto perpetuo idea in three different tempos. A heady combination of tonal, modal and atonal passages, it is an instantly likeable piece of toccata-type fun. The Michelangelos, joined by the pianist Giuseppe Mentuccia, embrace this style with gusto and deliver the constant juggling of different articulations and textures with utmost clarity, with a sound quality that is appropriately gritty and moody.

Ivan Tcherepnin’s There was no wind of 1996, for soprano and string quartet, allows the old to collide with the new. It is based on a folk song of the same name from the classic anthology compiled and arranged by Mily Balakirev in the 1860s (Ivan’s grandfather was within Balakirev’s musical circle). The song is ‘unwrapped’, with the lyric of each verse illustrated by the instrumental music: the noisy arrival of guests to the party, the dancing, the damage to the house and crockery, the kind-hearted mother’s consolation. The song in Balakirev’s arrangement appears intact, and is allowed to sound oddly out of place. Siobhan Stagg’s interpretation is not at all folksy but sonorous and expressive, at times anxious and overwrought – this may be a good fit for the ironic attitude of Ivan Tcherepnin in his ‘postmodern’ period. Her delivery does not allow the listener to follow the text easily, but this is fortunately provided in the booklet.

All in all, this is an attractive collection of curiosities presented with affection, commitment and attention to stylistic variety.