The annual Young Artists series of the Park Lane Group may not be everything it says on the tin, but you can be pretty sure of what to expect. Long gone from Park Lane and not really a group, PLG seldom strays from the formula of promoting young musicians you want to hear again performing works you’d rather not have to re-encounter. This pair of concerts, however, was slightly different, in featuring several of the most worthwhile composers of our time.

Tippett’s Piano Sonata No 2 ought to have been very welcome, but it was Mei Yi Foo’s bad luck to be playing it within days of Steven Osborne’s magnificent Wigmore Hall performance. Next to his rigorous account, this one highlighted all the difficulties. Foo had the virtuosity required, but was lightweight and mechanical by comparison.

Her choice of Ligeti was equally promising, but the two Etudes could have had more flair; Fanfares, especially, needed greater attack and glitter. Just as Ligeti’s Etudes are modelled on Debussy, so Unsuk Chin’s Etudes draw inspiration from Ligeti, and it was good to hear the incessant teasing of her Toccata. Foo’s models in her own Sonic Vision, which she premiered here, are also strong, but this tightly constructed music lacks real individuality. The same could be said of Dai Fujikura’s basically atmospheric Lost Shadows.

The musical substance of the evening was supplied by the cellist Marie McLeod and the pianist Martin Sturfält, who began with Lutoslawski’s dark and moody Grave. McLeod produces rich tone, but she is also a gutsy, communicative player never afraid of digging in: Moto is one of Magnus Lindberg’s most virtuosic pieces and she rose to its special challenges. Both players were also strong in Huw Watkins’s impassioned, post-Romantic Cello Sonata, and they did all that was required in James MacMillan’s aggressive and gaudy Cello Sonata No 2.

Richard Craig is a brilliant flautist, but unfortunately the contemporary flute repertory is of limited interest. James Dillon’s Sgothan at least finds expressive potential in the instrument’s flutterings; Fujikura’s Poison Mushroom adds electronic samplings in an attempt to create interest; and Kaija Saariaho’s Laconisme de l’Aile draws on poetry, but becomes memorable only at its delicate close.

Relying for distinction on the bass flute’s sound, Michael Finnissy’s Ulpirra evokes an alto didgeridoo, but nothing was as unpleasant as Franco Donatoni’s Nini, where the piccolo is as painful as an ear infection.