The difference in timing fairly leaps off the page—20 minutes! It's partly explained by the Tatrai's omission of the exposition repeats in movements Nos. 2 to 7 (Haydn himself removed them in his later choral version), but even then the final Largo, ''Father, into Thy hands'', is nearly twice as long in the Cherubini version. On the whole the Cherubini are slower, but the intensity and control of their playing ensures that for most of the time it works very well. I prefer the Tatrai's leader in No. 7's decorative violin solo—urgency as well as elegance here but although the Cherubini's expansiveness does occasionally place undue weight on ornamental details, the gravity and beauty is strong compensation, as for instance in No. 7's ethereal coda, and in the dramatic Introduction and concluding ''Earthquake'' the fortissimos have more bite and the contrasts are sharper.
Of course there will be those who find the prospect of a 75-minute chain of slow movements daunting. I'd urge even them to go for the EMI disc, 10'52'' looks like a long time for the wonderful No. 5, ''I thirst'', but the Cherubini convinced me that this is another case of ''heavenly length''—neither this nor any of the other movements seems over-long in itself. As for recording quality, again I think EMI have the advantage: both discs sound a little over-bright at the top: the Cherubini are closer recorded and this, coupled with the intense delivery in high fortissimo, gives their version more of an edge, but the atmosphere of Eisenstadt's Haydn Saal is well caught, after this the Tatrai's acoustic sounds somewhat airless though the pizzicato quavers at the start of No. 5 are accompanied by weird reverberation—electrickery?'