In the third of a series of Schumann concerts given by Andras Schiff and colleagues, the soprano Juliane Banse tackled the cycle Frauenliebe und -leben in a joyously musical way, making no apologies for the unsubtle emotional world of the texts but polishing every phrase until it gleamed. She sang the rarely heard Poems of Mary Stuart too - these are late, almost suffocatingly internalised settings that inhabit a touchingly tragic world.

Schiff is a Lieder accompanist of rare distinction and a chamber player who leads by example: always watchful, always responsive to what his partners are doing. He supported the cellist Miklos Perenyi in the Five Pieces in Folk Style, and took charge of a wonderfully revealing account of the strange G minor Piano Trio. The violinist Yuuko Shiokawa has no pungent musical personality to match her colleagues' - a few passages in the trio were awfully plain - but her rapport with them was sufficient to lift this performance well above the routine.

***** Unmissable **** Recommended *** Enjoyable
** Mediocre * Terrible