A full house and a full platform: that was the scene at the latest Oxford Chamber Music Society concert. The platform had to cope not only with two extra players, but also with an audience overflow, but it kindly refrained from making creaking sounds of protest.

The extra players were Robert Plane (clarinet), and David Pyatt (horn), who joined the Magginis (Lorraine McAslan, David Angel, Martin Outram, and Michal Kaznowski) for a performance of John Ireland's rare Sextet. The 19-year-old Ireland wrote his Sextet after first hearing the Brahms clarinet quintet. But Stanford, his tutor, was disapproving, so Ireland consigned the work to a drawer for some 60 years - a fate it did not deserve, as this performance made clear. The music may not plumb great depths, nor is it strikingly original (the influence of both Brahms and Dvorak is often apparent), but there is plenty to savour nonetheless. Ireland handles the scoring with assurance, and in particular draws a wide range of tone colours from the clarinet. Oxford first, the world later: these performers will shortly record the Sextet for Naxos.

While Ireland was a comparative novice when he composed his Sextet, Haydn was already hugely experienced by the time he produced his Quartet in F minor, opus 20, no 5, the work that opened this concert. Yet, as cellist Michal Kaznowski pointed out beforehand, Haydn had amazingly felt the need to improve his compositional skills just before he set to work on this quartet. In this performance, the minor key, and generally wistful nature of the music, were emphasised from the moment leader Lorraine McAslan embarked on her husky-toned first entry.

There were plenty of bubbling tunes in the final work, Mendelssohn's E minor quartet, opus 44, no 2. This music suited the Magginis well - the quicksilver scherzo reminded me of a Jack Russell, ever eager to hurry along and investigate the next interesting scent.