There are lovely moments in Thomas Dyke Acland Tellefsen’s two piano concertos. The First (1847 48), Jeremy Nicholas tells us in his enlightening and entertaining booklet note, may have been written under the supervision of Tellefsen’s teacher Frédéric Chopin, but one can hear the master’s influence clearly in both. Try the passage starting at 3'15" in the opening movement of the Norwegian composer’s Second (1853), for instance, as it seems as if it could have been lifted from Chopin’s E minor Concerto.

At the same time, Tellefsen often takes his own path, and his individuality makes itself felt in small but important ways. Note in that same movement, say, how the lyrical second theme (a Mozartian tune that might have suited Zerlina in Don Giovanni) slips unceremoniously into the minor mode at 5'00", or sample the foreshortened transition to the recapitulation at 9'50".

There’s a lovely duet between the soloist and the first-chair clarinettist in the First’s central Andante (at 3'27"), and a few magical bars in the Adagio of the Second where some unexpected harmonies are illuminated by the strings’ warm radiance. The strongest movement, though, is probably the First’s finale – a rough-hewn dance drawn from Norwegian folk music, including a passage at 3'13" that looks forward to Grieg’s livelier Lyric Pieces.

These concertos have been recorded before – the First by Hubert Rutkowski (Accord, 4/13) and both by Einar Steen-Nøkleberg (Simax) – but Howard Shelley’s finesse and steadfast grace (in music that isn’t always that graceful) coupled with Hyperion’s superb engineering make this new version the clear front-runner. The bonus work, Friedrich Kalkbrenner’s March, Storm and Polonaise (1828), rather outstays its welcome but it’s a pleasant diversion nonetheless. Nicholas writes that it demands ‘the most delicate bravura to negotiate’, and Shelley somehow manages this while simultaneously keeping the Nuremberg orchestra on its toes – an impressive achievement.