Joshua Bell and Jeremy Denk, a notably well-matched team, give idiomatic performances of these three sonatas (Denk also provides outstanding booklet-notes). They’re especially adept in maintaining the flow of the musical narrative and, with it, the music’s emotional flux.

I find the Saint-Saëns a slightly disappointing work: despite the fascinating metrical irregularity of its first movement and scherzo, and a brilliant finale, hints of superficiality pervade many passages. The best movement is surely the sensuous Adagio; Bell and Denk capture its tender mood perfectly, as well as making a virtuoso tour de force of the finale.

Their performance of the Ravel offers an interesting contrast with Alina Ibragimova and Cédric Tiberghien’s recent recording. Where they opt for the most vivid, even grotesque contrasts, Denk and Bell stress continuity. In the central ‘Blues’ movement they achieve a subtle balance between 1920s jazz and Ravel’s French style; Tiberghien and Ibragimova present instead a distorted, dreamlike vision. Bell is especially impressive in the moto perpetuo finale – not only thrillingly precise but full of colour and variety, too.

In the Franck, with its wide stretches for the pianist, Jeremy Denk is particularly successful in avoiding spread chords. Franck, however, was writing in an era when chords were habitually spread, and I think he is denying himself an important expressive resource. Otherwise, he and Bell give an enthralling account, taking note of all Franck’s instructions as to character, dynamics and variation of tempo, though without adding any of the extraneous histrionic inflections we hear on the recording by Dora Schwarzberg and Martha Argerich.