Sayaka Shoji has excellent credentials as a player of these concertos. The cantabile lines that play an important role in both works benefit from her refined style and ability to retain interest with small but effective expressive nuances. Her playing is often restrained, yet she embraces wholeheartedly the passionate outbursts, as when the violin takes over the Passacaglia theme in the First Concerto (tr 3, 5'21"). The three cadenzas are superbly paced, that in the First Concerto building tension inexorably, the meditative one in the Second Concerto’s first movement a model of beautiful legato double-stopping. And in the fast, spiky movements, she appears as a true virtuoso – full of life and energy, and apparently able to perform the most demanding passages without having to be careful.

The orchestra plays with precision and commitment, and the recorded sound is big and spacious, evoking power and mystery. Yet there are places where I wished for clearer definition in the bass or in the important horn parts. I’m also reminded that David Oistrakh, dedicatee of these concertos, played them quite differently. In the Second Concerto’s opening movement he frequently moves the music on, ignoring the composer’s metronome marks and adding his own dynamic inflections. The result is more engaging; sorrowful, but not as cold and bleak. And the concerto’s finale has a harsh, desperate excitement lacking here. But I still salute Shoji’s brilliant, thoughtful interpretations.