With a shared love of the Brazilian songbook serving as its aesthetic lodestar, this hugely enjoyable album from Anat Cohen's new quartet opens with James Shipp's punningly titled and brilliantly atmospheric ‘Baroquen Spirit’. Excerpted from his 1980 album Circense, the tender radiance of Egberto Gismonti's ‘Palhaço’ is beautifully articulated by the quartet, with Cohen's clarinet at its most canorous. The moto perpetuo, marble-smooth groove of Maria Do Carmo Barbosa De Melo's ‘Boa Tarde Povo’ is a delight and features an especially artful solo from Gonçalves.

Of the trio of striking Cohen originals, ‘Canon’ leaves a particularly strong impression, not least the way in which bass clarinet, double bass and vibes initially coalesce around the beguilingly simple melodic line. Coloured by the distinctive timbre of the accordion, Mashiach's ‘The Old Guitar’ and ‘Vivi & Zaco’ at times seems to channel the bittersweetness of Piazzolla.

Arranged by the quartet, as with all of the music, another Gismonti piece, ‘Frevo’, reveals all of the ensemble's greatest qualities: joyous virtuosity (the rapid unison melodic lines of Cohen and Gonçalves are nothing short of miraculous), incredible dynamic control and – at its heart – a love of the ludic which inexorably draws the listener in. The quartet's supreme melodicism is highlighted in two further contrasting pieces, Antonín Dvorák's ‘Going Home’ (from the second movement of his 'Symphony No. 9'), and the magnificent ‘O Bôto’ penned by Antônio Carlos Jobim and Jararaca. A final shout-out must go to James Farber for the immaculate recording and mixing (at Sear Sound, NYC).