The majority of pieces on this generously filled release by the Amsterdam Sinfonietta under their violinist/director Candida Thompson tend towards the slow and melancholic. Although there’s a risk of monotony in such a programme, especially when played entirely by a string orchestra, the choice and sequencing of the pieces makes for an interesting and rewarding listen.

Wijnand van Klaveren’s arrangement of Berg’s Op 1 lacks the colour of the version for orchestra by the late Theo Verbey but is arguably more in keeping with the mood of the original for piano, as well as finding an intriguing kinship with the later Lyric Suite. An adaptation of the Prelude to Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde for strings is a more daring proposition but the arrangement by the British composer Adrian Williams conveys the essence of the music remarkably effectively. Both arrangements were commissioned by the Amsterdam Sinfonietta and the performances are suitably agile and impassioned.

Although performed as scored by Korngold, the slow movement of the Symphonic Serenade is less persuasive, not helped by the slightly pallid recording. I miss the additional richness and intensity John Mauceri finds in this movement in his recording of the complete work (Decca, 7/97). The Adagio from Bruckner’s String Quintet receives a fine performance but falls short of communicating the otherworldliness and rapture one hears in the recording by Skrowaczewski with the Saarbrücken Radio Symphony Orchestra (Oehms).

More valuable are the interpretations of Bridge’s Lament, composed in memory of a nine-year-old girl who drowned when the ocean liner RMS Lusitania was sunk in 1915, and the Adagio pour quatuor d’orchestre by the Belgian composer Guillaume Lekeu, who died at the age of 24 in 1894. The collection is rounded off by a dedicated performance of the Sextet from Strauss’s Capriccio, although once again I would have preferred a bit more warmth in the recording.