Presently a bassoonist with the Berlin Philharmonic, Václav Vonášek founded the Arundo wind ensemble as a trio in 2003, and invited a basset-horn colleague to join them for this Bach project. In arranging the Goldberg Variations, he explains in the booklet, he was most challenged by the virtuoso ‘arabesque’ variations that require hand-crossing on a keyboard. Presented here at rather conservative tempos, they do not come off with the prodigal flourish of either the keyboard original or Dmitri Sitkovetsky’s popular arrangement for string trio.

The impression of elevated but rather faceless Harmoniemusik is reinforced by consistently detached articulation that almost perversely robs many of the slower or swung or dance variations of a legato line when the tools are available for it. Whether done to imitate a harpsichord or in the name of neat and tidy performance practice, the phrasing combines with a straitlaced approach to ornamentation and pulse, and total absence of repeats, to present the Goldbergs as polished but inconsequential background music.

Requiring much less in the way of arrangement, the Suite comes off better, though even here the Arundo players mark too little difference between, say, the French overture’s central fugue and its grander outer sections. The subsequent dance movements inspire more graceful and subtly shaded phrasing, and in the Gavotte some rustic contrasts of timbre. But, again, why no repeats? In concert, with breath at a premium, the decision would be a pragmatic one. On a studio-recorded album running at well under an hour, it feels unduly parsimonious.