Clarinettist Barnaby Robson performs a rich programme of 20th-century and contemporary music for clarinet and piano, including world-premiere recordings.

The release opens with Barnaby Robson’s collaboration with BAFTA-winning sound designer Martin Cantwell: a recording of Steve Reich’s intricate New York Counterpoint, which involves eight pre-recorded clarinet lines (the forces of which are referenced in the album’s title.) Herbert Howells is celebrated for his choral music but his instrumental works are less famous; with pianist Fiona Harris, Robson performs the 1946 version of Howells’s Clarinet Sonata, never recorded before.

Three further world-premiere recordings follow: Robson’s arrangement for clarinet, viola and piano of George Fenton’s Snow Leopard – music originally composed for the BBC’s Planet Earth – for which Robson is joined by Simon Chamberlain (piano) and Rebecca Chambers (viola); Graham Fitkin’s mercurial Cusp for solo clarinet; and the witty Red Herring Blues for clarinet and piano by baritone-composer Roderick Williams.

The recording is rounded off with two 20th-century French works: Poulenc’s Sonata for two clarinets (Robson has recorded both parts) and Debussy’s dazzling Première Rhapsodie for clarinet and piano.