SUNDAY'S concert, set in the delightful venue of All Saints’ Church in Helmsley, opened with Debussy’s Sonata for Violin and Piano, the composer’s last completed work before his death in 1918.

Despite some slight intonation issues, I thought the performance by Levon Chilingirian (violin) and Ian Fountain (piano) was both solid and committed throughout. The opening Allegro is actually a broadly melodic affair and the playing captured the lyrical character of the music very well. The closing Finale put Mr Chilingirian through his paces with solo passages of explosive brilliance.

The programming of Edgar Bainton’s String Quartet in A minor seemed to be an inspired choice: the work was composed at the Ruhleben internment camp in 1915 (Messiaen wrote and performed his Quartet For The End Of Time in Görlitz, Germany). Alas not. The performance by the Quartet was entirely sympathetic, indeed both charming and elegant, but the work itself was just not that memorable; it lacked any real authority or originality.

It wasn’t helped by the fact that it was followed by the Messiaen, a work of towering authority and originality. The performance was excellent and the contribution from the clarinettist Andrew Marriner, a delight. His velvety rich tone and sense of a dramatic "otherness" – for example, the ultra quiet crescendos in the Abyss of Birds, was a joy.

It was both a mystery and a disappointment that the James MacMillan Motet III (for solo clarinet) didn’t happen. But I have to leave the last thoughts with cellist Stephen Orton and pianist Ian Fountain and their performance of Praise To The Eternity Of Jesus. It was not noticeably better than the other excellent performances, just profoundly moving.