I have first to declare my colours: I can’t see any real point in making recordings of piano transcriptions of Rimsky’s orchestral music even if they are the composer’s own work. In his day orchestral performances were few and far between, so this was a way of hearing the music outside the concert hall; that hardly applies today. That said, I have been astonished that in a piano transcription of Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite so much of the orchestral colouring comes over. This applies here in the central movements of Sheherazade, especially the second, where the music’s dramatic contrasts project vividly. But in the opening movement this duo miss the forward thrust of the sequential writing (try the Mackerras orchestral CD – Telarc, 10/90) and the performance seems limp.

Sadko is rather more telling, but one recalls that the composer described the Capriccio espagnole as “a brilliant composition for orchestra”, emphasising the variety of the instrumental effects on which it was based. Tuneful though it is, it hardly suits a piano duo, where most of these special effects are impossible, and the essential percussion condiment is non-existent. So while this is agreeable enough, and well played and recorded (in a rather resonant hall which sounds best in surround sound), this collection will be of prime interest to piano duettists.