This is a curiously old-fashioned sort of disc – a programme of orchestral pieces by different composers, linked only by the shared theme of Halloween. Ideal as a soundtrack to apple-bobbing, then; for the rest of the year it is essentially a snapshot of Kent Nagano and his Montreal orchestra circa 2015. As such, it’s pretty good. Those translucent strings and lean woodwinds are well served by Decca, and the recorded sound has an excitingly wide dynamic range, though the woodwinds might have been a little more forward. A few quiet vocalisations from Nagano notwithstanding, you wouldn’t realise that it was recorded live.

That also extends to the performances, which are for the most part smart and stylish. Nagano’s approach leans towards ‘symphonic’ rather than ‘poem’. His Dukas is swift and streamlined, and you can forget about midnight churchyards: the opening harp notes of Danse macabre are very definitely just down-beats. The low brass in the Mussorgsky sound ponderous rather than menacing. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Nagano responds more readily to the less familiar pieces, though I missed Rattle’s sense of theatre in Dvořák’s The Noonday Witch. This witch’s icy bass clarinet entry wouldn’t chill many spines.

Tamara comes off best: Nagano generates a wonderfully gloomy atmosphere in the opening bars and a powerful sense of forward movement. As Balakirev’s seductress weaves her spells, Nagano’s players – woodwinds in particular – respond with considerable character, even if they don’t quite match Gergiev and the LSO (not to mention Beecham) for flexibility and fire. An entertainingly manic performance of Ives’s not particularly spooky (but very Ivesian) ‘Hallowe’en’ makes a quirky encore. It’s nice to see a major label listing the orchestra’s personnel in the booklet, too.