In the right hands, ‘incidental’ and ‘occasional’ Beethoven, even from the often-overlooked and underrated period of the early 1810s, turns out not to be so incidental after all. But then listeners acquainted with Markus Bosch’s fine Bruckner series on Coviello will not be surprised by the spring in the step of the Ruins of Athens Overture, the graceful simplicity of the Opferlied’s phrasing or the powerfully conjured atmosphere at the start of Meeresstille und glückliche Fahrt. In all three works he leaves distinguished modern rivals (Tilson Thomas in the Opferlied and Chailly in Meeresstille, for example) at the starting post, integrating swifter tempos within an unfussy application of period principles.

At a time when the function of statuary is so contested, a really complete account of The Ruins of Athens is especially welcome. For the inauguration of the Imperial Theatre in what is now Budapest in 1812, Beethoven contributed a score in his most nationalistic vein to complement the anti-Turkish thrust of a new drama by the hot playwright of the day, August von Kotzebue, positioning the city as a bastion of Austro-Hungarian values, a new Athens. The musical numbers on Leif Segerstam’s lethargically paced Naxos recording are linked with heavy-handed chunks of Kotzebue’s dialogue, whereas the CPO solution is more imaginative: a new digest of the plot narrated by Athena, as if banished from her home city.

At the drama’s climax, a prayer of thanks for deliverance from barbarian hordes, issued by a Sarastro-like high priest with obbligato horns, is answered by a literal deus ex machina in the shape of a new statue of the Kaiser. At this point Kotzebue’s text, pledging loyalty to the Habsburg monarchy, has been removed – pulled down, you might say – and replaced with verses from Schiller’s ‘An die Freude’ (not the familiar text of the Ninth’s finale): an elegant piece of rewritten history, fully explained in the booklet, which should satisfy all but the most diehard imperialists.

Quibbles? The chorus lacks the power and unanimity of the Beecham Choral Society (EMI, 8/58), singing in English and in another, more innocent age. The lovely cello solo twining around the Opferlied’s second verse deserved some help from the microphones. Otherwise, it’s one of the more novel and instructive contributions to this Beethoven year.