AccentusNaïve V5301 (5 CDs) *****

This special-priced compilation celebrates the 20th anniversary season of the French choir Accentus. The repertoire alone suggests a group with a difference. The three requiems included here are by Brahms, sounding like genuine chamber music in the version with four- handed piano accompaniment; Fauré, performed with exquisite tenderness; and Pascal Dusapin; three mostly contemplative works from the 1990s, bracketed as Requiem(s). Laurence Equilbey and her choir are equally fine in Haydn's oratorio The Seven Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross, with the period instruments of the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin. But the most astonishing performances are on the CD called Transcriptions, where originals by Mahler, Bach, Chopin, Wolf, Berg, Debussy and Ravel are transformed in ways you're unlikely ever to have imagined. url.ie/8fjv