Sian Edwards adopts relaxed speeds [in the Strauss], which gives the music space to breathe, and the RSNO sound consistently good throughout. Watts does ravishing things with the great clarinet melody with which the work opens, to which Perkins responds with a gruffness that gradually broadens into deeply felt lyricism…[the Glinka] finds Watts and Perkins squaring off and duetting like protagonists from one of the bel canto operas that inspired it, while Roscoe accompanies them with understated subtlety.

The Duet-Concertino…is beautifully performed here, and beautifully explained by Perkins in the booklet…Glinka’s Trio pathètique and an apt adaptation of Beethoven’s Trio, Op 38, follow.

A beauty and the beast tale in which a princess, represented by Sarah Watts’ beautifully lyrical clarinet, dances with a bear – Laurence Perkins’s balletic bassoon. It sounds twee, but Strauss was making a point...These two fine players are joined by the pianist Martin Roscoe for sparkling performances of Beethoven’s Trio in E flat, Op 38 and Glinka’s Trio Pathétique in D minor.