What might at first glance appear to be just another ‘classical pops’ album proves an unexpected treat. It helps, of course, that Emmanuel Pahud is such a magnetic artist, playing with a poise, purity and imaginative flair to compel the listener’s attention. The BPO’s principal flute, Pahud first met the Japanese harpist Mariko Anraku in 1990 (the year after he had won the Kobe International Flute Competition) and, by the sound of it, she’s an extremely accomplished performer in her own right. Takemitsu’s Toward the Sea III is especially fine, with Pahud on alto flute, and I also enjoyed the same composer’s reworking of the ‘Prelude’ to the First Act from Satie’s 1891 incidental music for Le Fils des étoiles.

Otherwise, it’s bonnes bouches pretty much all the way, but it would be a curmudgeonly soul who did not respond to Pahud’s airborne phrasing in ‘En bateau’ from Debussy’s Petite suite or marvel at his pianissimo tone in the vertiginous middle section of Monti’s ubiquitous Csárdás. The ideally balanced recording was supervised by Paul Zinman, son of conductor David (with whom Pahud recently collaborated on a stunning account of Ibert’s Concerto – EMI, 11/03).