The second volume of Barry Douglas 's Brahms series again mixes works from either end of the composer's career, using Ballades early and late, Intermezzos from the composers last sets of pieces, and the demanding E flat Rhapsody from Op 119 as a prelude to the virtuosic Sonata in F minor, Op 5. The playing is explicit and blunt rather than inward and, in the opening movement of the sonata, self-accommodating in a way that undermines continuity – so many adjustments of tempo can lead to a feeling that there's actually no basic tempo at all. The straight-talking approach may eliminate liquidity of melodic line, but some of the craggy perspectives it throws up turn out to be of interest in themselves. url.ie/f1f2