Here at last is a recording to persuade sceptics that Prokofiev's Cello Concerto is not just an interesting but rather drab failure...both Isserlis and Jarvi leave their competition standing when it comes to expressive eloquence.

In the first movement Isserlis conjures some surprising, visceral sounds from his instrument, ratcheting up the tension with a febrile, nervy vibrato up high...The soloist contributes his own lively and individualistic booklet-notes, enhancing the value of a fascinating, I'd say unmissable project.

Isserlis wrestles like a cellistic Jacob with a fiendishly difficult and un-rewarding solo part; his victory in the closing bars over his sparring partners, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra and their conductor Paavo Järvi, is the culmination of a struggle both heroic and hard-fought!

In his fascinating booklet note, Isserlis makes a persuasive case for preferring Prokofiev’s 1938 Concerto in E minor to its radical revision...If the earlier version is no masterpiece...this performance vindicates that preference.