The 19th century witnessed an almost insatiable demand for arrangements and transcriptions to be played on domestic pianos. Brahms himself wrote such works under the names GW Marks and Karl Würth but friends and colleagues also contributed. The violinist, pianist and conductor Paul Klengel (1854-1935), brother of the eminent cellist Julius, made solo piano versions of the Horn Trio and the Clarinet Quintet, transcribing with remarkable fidelity and sensitivity Brahms’s myriad expressive and technical demands.

Born in Wales, Christopher Williams is a music graduate of Cardiff University and now leads a busy and varied professional life as a pianist, composer, conductor, teacher and arranger. He is currently assistant director of the BBC National Chorus of Wales and is a pianist for the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, with whom he has performed at the BBC Proms and recorded for the Chandos and Hyperion labels. In addition to his work as a soloist, Williams is in great demand as an accompanist and chamber musician, and has partnered many of the prominent instrumentalists of his generation including Philippe Schartz, Tim Thorpe, David Childs, David Pyatt and Tine Thing Helseth. He has also appeared on BBC TV and been broadcast on BBC Radio and Radio Luxembourg.