Five of these 10 tracks are for solo piano, two for solo violin and the other three for instrumental ensembles. The young Japanese violinist Keisuke Okazaki has been an inspiration to Morgan Hayes in recent years, a virtuoso unusual among prizewinners of the major competitions for taking on a concerto such as this one. If the composer is new to you, Lucky’s Speech could be a good introduction, a two-minute torrent for solo violin, coming seemingly out of nowhere, as Lucky’s stream of gibberish does in Waiting for Godot.

The Concerto apart – Hayes’s most elaborate continuous structure to date – all the pieces are short. Continuities are of the kind that bring film editing techniques to mind, with juxtapositioning and cross-cutting rather than blending or overlapping, and with no notion at all of relating invention to a principal idea. You can sometimes question the coherence (or fail to get the point, perhaps) but never remain oblivious. The startle factor is high. Expect spontaneity and, in the piano pieces particularly, an impression that the gestural activity has been born out of improvisation, under the hands, with the surfaces worked as a painter might. Variations of density and intensity are present, cheek by jowl, and an abundance of contrasts which take one by surprise more often than not, as the endings certainly do, arriving like shutdown.

Expect also the piano keyboard to be treated as a metaphor for musical space, like a canvas. Hayes is minded to be percussive rather than lyrical in his piano-writing and there are frequent passages reaching high saturation levels of horizontal and vertical activity. More interestingly, there are surprises, throughout the disc, which derive from his interest in approaching musical material of diverse kinds, as they do in the work of Michael Finnissy, his principal teacher. Slippage, one of the ensemble numbers, seems to me to contain an excess of volatility and ‘extreme’ invention to be accommodated effectively in an eight-minute frame, whereas the more recent Violin Concerto, at twice the duration, shows a more assured handling of mass and detail and control of an incipient dramatic discourse.

NMC has given Hayes an attractive visiting card which makes me curious to follow what he will do next. I’ve had the pleasure of recognition in returning to most of what’s on offer here, and I warm to the freshness. Excellent performances and recording all round.