Spohr was in many ways a transitional figure, linking the formal disciplines of the Classical age of Mozart and Haydn with the highly coloured and emotional music of the romantic era (though he was later regarded as rather old-fashioned by such full-blown romantics as Wagner, Tchaikovsky, Richard Strauss and their followers). Fittingly, his chamber music reflects the more intimate, warm and lyrical aspects of a composer better known in his lifetime as a master of the orchestra. Sounding at times like an amalgam of Boccherini, Beethoven and Mendelssohn, it is now being rediscovered by music-lovers the world over – a renaissance of interest for which Marco Polo is proud to take part of the credit.