Tchaikovsky’s much-maligned Second Concerto is still a relative rarity so any new recording is an event, especially with a line-up as classy as this one. Simon Trpčeski declares in the note that he’d long wanted to play the piece and to bring out its ‘sunny side’. This he certainly does with a brisk opening movement (so much more convincing than Cherkassky’s strangely dogged affair) – very much along the lines of Graffman, Marshev and Donohoe in terms of spirit. The decision to use Siloti’s monstrous cut in the slow movement is a pity, though he’s in good company – with only Donohoe and Marshev opting for the full-fat original. However, I do find Trpčeski’s desychronised hands in the piano’s soliloquies a touch mannered and, though his Liverpool string soloists are lustrous-sounding, Donohoe has the almost ludicrously luxury casting of Nigel Kennedy and Steven Isserlis. Graffman’s Philadelphia players are also intensely characterful and wonderfully forwardly recorded. The finale sparkles in Petrenko’s hands, with some perky wind-playing, but Trpčeski tends to be a bit heavy-handed with the accentuation (Gilels, superb in the slow movement, is a touch steady here compared to Trpčeski and Donohoe).

The First Concerto is of course a very different animal. If ever there’s a place for ego in music, it’s here: I want to be mesmerised by the charisma of the person seated at the piano. The list of greats in this work is so legion that those below are just a random selection. Trpčeski and Petrenko’s conception is airier, less fulsome than many. But while that paid dividends in the Second Concerto, it makes the opening movement of the First seem a little underpowered. Trpčeski does not transfix in the way that Argerich, Volodos, Sokolov, Graffman or Bronfman do. And the problem with the slow movement is that it’s just too slow. This doesn’t just make life difficult for the soloist – the flute has a hard time of it too (just compare Abbado’s shaping of phrases for Argerich). The finale comes off best, though it’s Petrenko who is the more playful, the pianist’s accentuation at times tending towards harshness.