Arguably, both recordings here are firsts, as although Skalkottas’s Violin Concerto (1937 38) has appeared on CD before, this is the first recording of the new critical edition, correcting ‘mistakes, misreadings and [deciding] on the best text’ from the various sources, by Dr Eva Mantzourani (author incidentally of the two best studies in English on the composer). The most noticeable outward difference with BIS’s previous recording is the timing of the concerto’s opening Molto appassionato and central Andante spirito, significantly shorter in this new version, by 1'30" and 4' respectively. Brabbins’s firm, no-nonsense tempos provide a tauter framework for Zacharias and keep the central span moving where Georgios Demertzis and Nikos Christodoulou in Malmö arguably turned the latter into Adagio spirito (albeit beautifully achieved). Curiously, Brabbins is markedly slower at the outset of the Allegro vivo vivacissimo finale, though the Prestissimo conclusion thrills exactly as it should.

For many, however, the main novelty will be the Concerto for violin, viola and large wind ensemble (1939 40), given its first recording here by Zacharias (using his own edition) with viola player Alexandros Koustas. As in the Violin Concerto, Skalkottas here deployed his personal 12-note method, but it is Hindemith that one is reminded of throughout. Not often cited as an influence on him, Skalkottas must have encountered the German’s music when studying in Berlin and this double concerto is audibly a musical grandchild of the 1920s Kammermusiken. Skalkottas’s scoring – needing far more players than the 10 required in his Third Piano Concerto (BIS, 3/05; Paladino, 5/20) – is miraculously clear, but required Brabbins and the London Philharmonic’s woodwinds and brass to be on top form; they are and never overwhelm the soloists. I found Zacharias wobbly in intonation in a couple of points in the solo concerto but not in the later work. BIS’s sound is superb.