Though Brahms’s two sets of Liebeslieder-Walzer were conceived with the domestic market in mind, they have inevitably attracted starry quartets (not to mention starry pianists) on disc. This new set, recorded at a single Verbier concert some 13 years ago and including a clutch of songs for each member of the quartet, concedes nothing in star power, even if two of the singers, Andrea Rost and Matthew Polenzani, are arguably better known in opera than in Lieder.

Both Liebeslieder sets benefit from a real sense of relaxed, spur-of-the-moment music-making, with, one senses, James Levine and Yefim Bronfman sharing the driving seat, keeping the faster numbers urgent and vigorous, and allowing plenty of time in the slower numbers. Their top-quality pianism really lets us hear a wealth of delightful detail.

The quartet themselves make an appealingly lively sound, less euphonious perhaps than DG’s earlier Mathis-Fassbaender-Schreier-DFD line-up or, particularly, EMI’s perfectly matched 1994 quartet of Bonney, von Otter, Streit and Bär. Here we have the firm foundations of Thomas Quasthoff’s appealingly open, purring bass-baritone, with the inner parts filled by Matthew Polenzani’s bright, buzzy tenor and Madgalena Kožená’s rich, colourful mezzo. Andrea Rost is perhaps a little disappointing, though: her timbre is so highly buffed on its surface that you get little sense of the grain beneath, and the words are under-projected.

Quasthoff and especially Kožená are strongest in their solo selections, the mezzo’s three songs distinguished by her plangent tone and slightly shimmering vibrato. Polenzani sings with pleasingly ardent tone, but doesn’t sound entirely relaxed or totally idiomatic in the difficult opening spot.

The sound is lively and clear, placing the pianos – easily distinguishable from one another – at the front. A fun, well-filled disc.