Benjamin Hochman’s Avie solo debut frames two fascinating and relatively unfamiliar contemporary Schubert tributes between two frequently recorded Schubert sonatas. A series of evocatively stark chords makes up György Kurtág’s minute-long Hommage à Schubert, a piece as striking for what it says as for what it leaves unspoken. Idyll and Abyss by Jörg Widmann contains six short movements that interweave and superimpose dynamically varied Schubert passages and dissonant original material into wispy, gentle and ear-catching collages.

Hochman brings requisite songfulness and understatement to Schubert’s ‘little’ A major Sonata, D664, although his held-back Allegro finale yields to more vital, bracingly characterised interpretations (Anna Malikova is a particular favourite). Hochman’s rock-steady unfolding of the opening Allegro vivace of the D major Sonata, D850, evokes similarly architectonic versions by Ashkenazy, Goode and Richter, yet with less thrust and forward impetus. By contrast, Hochman takes the slow movement at a genuine yet flexible Con moto that underlines the movement’s combination of disarming lyricism and rhythmic unrest. The Scherzo’s dotted rhythms are incisively sprung and dramatically inflected in ways that leave Alice Sara Ott’s recent, relatively heavy-handed account at the starting gate. However, Hochman’s meticulous balances and textural control in the Rondo sound a tad too earnest and monumental when compared to the faster, lighter and more humorously tinged interpretations by Richard Goode and Mitsuko Uchida. Notwithstanding his Schubertian potential, Hochman’s perceptive Kurtág and Widmann performances leave a stronger overall impression.