I almost began this review by saying that the caprice is the star of the show, but I checked myself, because the real star of the show is of course Humphreys herself. This is due not only to the musicality of her playing but to the fact that half of the 14 works presented here are premiere recordings, five of them commissioned by Humphreys – including the 12 variations, each by a different composer, on Paganini’s Caprice No 24. That’s a lot of commissioning and a lot of challenging new repertoire to get under one’s fingers, all adding to the impression that Humphreys is one of the younger generation’s most interesting violinists.

The premiere recording of Tom Coult’s four Études is the curtain-raiser. This is not one of Humphreys’s own commissions, but it makes a savvy opening gambit for the forceful punch of No 1’s initial parallel octaves and the striking programmatic quality of its subsequent glissandos – played upwards, downwards and in contrary motion – designed to evoke the sounds of jet engines, among other things. Humphreys combines muscular power with solid technical control, the sustained octave doublings even in tone and balance, and a huge and detailed dynamic range. The hushed No 4 uses a special circling technique that allows the violinist to quietly sustain three notes at once, although perhaps its most ear-tickling moments are the broken chords intoned in harmonics, for their ethereal yet still ‘present’ quality.

The variations on Paganini’s Caprice No 24 range in length from a mere 22 seconds to just over two minutes, by composers from Sally Beamish to Stuart McRae and Heloïse Werner. First up is Andra Patterson’s, offering skittish figures, delicately voiced angular leaps and atonal scrunches. It’s an absolute winner, and each subsequent offering is equally a surprise-filled virtuoso gem. Humphreys’s deft ordering might lead you to think that these highly contrasting vignettes were conceived in this order from the outset, such is the overall flow and dramatic pacing.

Some readers will recognise Caffeine, Freya Waley-Cohen’s wired, dancing play on rondo form, as having begun life as a 2019 solo recorder work for Tabea Debus. Humphreys asked for this solo violin version after attending its premiere, and the result, to my ears, subtly and gorgeously channels Ysaÿe as she brings a panoply of colour and sparkle to its dizzyingly rapid implied polyphony.

The programme-binding Paganini and Kreisler works are also strong. Paganini’s Caprice No 9 is separated off as a stand-alone piece, and performed with an exuberant grit and storytelling flair that treat it as such. I was equally riveted by the husky richness of Humphreys’s tone, and again her dramatic pacing and range of colour, in the Recitativo preceding Kreisler’s Scherzo-caprice. Really, very impressive.