Hovhaness is nothing if not prolific. The most recent work here, the Tenth Concerto, Op. 413, dates from 1988, so Op. 500 cannot be far off. Unsurprisingly, this oeuvre is uneven and the present issue exemplifies its best and worst aspects: ecstatic melodism (anticipating Part, Gorecki and Rautavaara by decades), enchanting harmonic writing resonant of East and West but without the internal tensions of either, beguiling orchestration, empty note-spinning and a lack of contrapuntal purpose.
Hovhaness has made much over the years of his international heritage. The three Armenian Rhapsodies (1944) are full of local colour and each ends well within its length, yet somehow they neither cohere as a triptych nor fully satisfy individually. The aforementioned Tenth Concerto is in six meandering movements (the finale’s title, “Wandering in Space”, is more apposite than may have been intended) reprising the Vaughan Williams-like sound base of much of his music for strings. Laid out for piano, trumpet and strings, the concerto has little of the memorability of similarly scored pieces by Shostakovich (Piano Concerto No. 1) or Jolivet (Concertino, 1948). As with the Rhapsodies, Gerard Schwarz and the Seattle orchestra play it for all it is worth. The composer conducts two of Symphony No. 38’s five movements, with his wife singing the very high soprano part. The effect is not unlike a Lark ascending of some rare Asiatic breed. What we are given of this 1978 composition (amounting to 19 minutes of music) feels very incomplete, and a misrepresentation of the whole. Hovhaness’s cause has been better served elsewhere.'