The Schloss vor Husum Festival has just marked its its 25th year. A celebration of the byways of piano literature, much of it relegated to ill-deserved obscurity, it has encouraged an assortment of outstanding pianists to relax in a convivial and rewarding atmosphere where they are free to perform music frowned on by more commercially minded venues. Once again all the performances on the offering from 2010 are as sympathetic as you could wish.

There is Marc-André Hamelin, a true and loyal friend to Husum, in CPE Bach, relishing every twist and turn of the argument. No need to worry about rubato like so much ‘daylight robbery’ (the booklet-note), for Hamelin plays with all of his legendary discipline and authority. Jean-Frédéric Neuburger tosses off two Heller storm-in-a-teacup Etudes (though No 3 has a charming central section) with all the necessary aplomb, and Ian Fountain gives us a sizeable Wagner-Kocsis transcription with special commitment. Busoni’s austere funeral march of a Prelude must have sent the audience out into the night haunted and provoked, and how fascinating to be reminded that the author of Doctor Zhivago was a composer of distinction, following Scriabin’s path from early Romanticism to an altogether more cloudy and obsessive idiom. Peter Froundjian hardly needs an introduction at Husum and his performance of Jørgen Bentzon’s Variations on Chopin’s F major Mazurka, Op 68 No 3, is fluent and persuasive. Finally Robert Helps’s heartfelt tribute to Fauré, a composer whose outward urbanity often hid so many subtle and dark secrets. Once again this is an invaluable enterprise; and, with the promise of 2011’s celebrations of both Liszt’s more rarely heard works and music by York Bowen, there are clearly riches to follow.