Last year the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin made their debut on Pentatone (hopping over from Harmonia Mundi) with the first six of Handel’s 12-strong collection of Op 6 Concerti grossi (10/19) – Corelli-inspired works published in 1740 that were probably used as between-act entertainment at London performances of Handel’s theatre oratorios. Lindsay Kemp reviewed that earlier album, and my own feelings about this concluding half are pretty much in tune with his.

Broad brushstrokes first, and the acoustic of Berlin’s Nikodemuskirche is great: a little distance without being distant, allowing us to hear the music’s relationship with its surrounding space. Texture-wise, meanwhile, there’s weight where you want it, and not where you don’t. Note also that while the first disc featured Handel’s optional oboe parts, there were no such parts offered for Nos 7 to 12, meaning this disc is for strings and keyboard only.

It’s all immensely stylish. Take the nimbly neat, soft suavity with which they serve up No 9 in F major’s Allegro, the balance giving us delicious lashings of Miguel Rincón Rodriguez’s lute, and the harpsichord pleasingly (to my taste) further back than you’ll find on Pinnock’s zesty reading with The English Concert. I also warmed tremendously to their flowing, swifter-than-average Overture to No 10 in D minor; it’s an entirely different brand of drama to the weightier, punchier readings from the likes of Manze and the Academy of Ancient Music, or Pinnock with The English Concert, but for me perhaps even more satisfying.

Returning to No 9, the Menuet’s tempo hits its dance roots on the nail while retaining courtly stateliness (whereas you’d have a job moving smoothly to Pinnock’s slower reading), and while the dynamic variation is subtle, it’s there. That said, if you also want the major-key shafts of light within the minor to bring a genuine change of colour – to be a genuine burst of joy, in effect – then head to Giovanni Antonini and Il Giardino Armonico. Likewise, while the ensuing Gigue comes with gentle, bouncy grace, I personally get more excited by Antonini’s string-gripping, twinkle-toed merriness.

Class and polish? Tick. Brimming with spontaneity? Less so. Overall, though, there’s much to enjoy here.