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One or more of these 1995 thru 1997 recordings have been, and/or still are, available separately. NCA has conveniently and, it must be said, quite elegantly repackaged them in a handsomely appointed foldout set. The first disc in this set, the op. 56 quintets, was reviewed as far back as 10 years ago by John Bauman in 23:6 in all of three brief paragraphs. Franz Danzi, (1763-1826) an almost exact contemporary of Beethoven, perhaps deserves a bit more than that, but frankly, not a lot more. He got it in 31:3 from Steven E. Ritter who reviewed a three-CD BIS set of Danzi's complete wind quintets performed on modern instruments by the Berlin Philharmonic Wind Quintet that were recorded half-a-dozen years earlier than these NCA releases.

Belgian-born Martin-Joseph Mengal (1784-1851) was a horn virtuoso who first studied with his father, entering the Conservatoire in Paris in 1804. He soon became principal horn with the Opéra Comique and held the position for 13 years. While in Paris, Mengal, through his composition teacher Anton Reicha, made the acquaintance of the five musicians for whom Reicha composed his 23 wind quintets.

In a note accompanying this new Winterreise with Jan Van Elsacker, the fortepianist and musicologist Tom Beghin asks what yet another new recording of Schubert’s great song-cycle might offer. The answer, in the first instance, is the instrument Beghin plays, a newly restored Gottlieb Hafner from Vienna c1830, whose five pedals – and attendant effects – Beghin is unafraid to employ.

One of the great cycles. Of the hundred or so available recorded cycles (out of about one hundred and fifteen or so), this rates as one of the best. In better sound than either the DG stereo cycle and the live King International cycle, Kempff's style is more poetic and less intense and fiery than others. Whatever Kempff may give away in terms of speed, power, and precision, he makes up for in other ways