THREE for the price of one is irresistible anywhere and concertgoers are not immune: the format has worked well for Ryedale Festival over the years. But it’s hard work for the musicians.

Chamber choir Consortium, guitarist Craig Ogden, and the Fitzwilliam Quartet with pianist and festival director Christopher Glynn, all had to give the same performance three times, while their tripartite audience switched venues within Castle Howard.

In the Chapel, the ten voices of Consortium under Andrew-John Smith delved into Latin motets by English 16th-century composers. Despite excellent intonation and keen phrasing, the choir delivered enough volume for a cathedral.

Byrd’s Haec Dies, with solo voices on the six parts, was more to scale and crisply rhythmic. The first half of Tallis’s Lamentations was not smooth enough to evoke much sense of mourning. Smith might achieve subtler results if he were more selective in his movements, though he found effective contrasts within Robert White’s Exaudiat Te.

You would have to travel a long way to find a guitarist with nimbler fingerwork than Craig Ogden, who played in the Great Hall. Yet he radiates a sense of spontaneity even at rapid tempos. So Albeniz’s old chestnut Asturias sounded freshly minted.

He relished Piazzolla’s sultry harmonies, danced deftly through a Mangoré waltz and, even without its repeats, was spellbinding in Sor’s variations on a Mozart theme.

So well-matched were the Fitzwilliam and Christopher Glynn in Schumann’s Piano Quintet that they might have been long-term partners.

Playing in the Long Gallery, Glynn was sensitive enough never to assume the role of concerto-soloist. So the strings were allowed to express themselves, typified by Heather Tuach’s mellow second-theme cello in the opening movement. Tempo changes in the Largamente were excellently judged and the finale lusciously teasing.

A bargain evening.