Erland von Koch (1910-2009) was very prolific in a composing career lasting over eight decades. A number of his works have been recorded but not many have made a sustained impression outside Sweden; indeed, this is the first disc devoted to his music to be reviewed in these pages. I first encountered his music 40 years ago with Stig Westerberg’s vibrant Swedish Radio recording (nla) of the wonderful Nordic Capriccio (1943), one of my favourite shorter Nordic works, which the orchestra recorded again with B Tommy Andersson in 1998 for Phono Suecia (still available). Per Hammarström, in his first recording, secures a performance – recorded live in 2010 – that is if anything the tautest yet and wrings even more warmth from the lyrical second subject (based on a Dalecarlian folk tune).

Impulses (1964) is the first instalment of the Impulsi Trilogy; the three movements – Echoes and Rhythms are the others – are performable separately. Westerberg recorded it in the 1970s for Swedish Society (still available, though usually as a download only). There’s little to choose between Westerberg’s and Hammarström’s accounts but BIS’s richer sound catches Koch’s beautifully crafted sonorities with greater clarity.

The main part of the disc is given over to premiere recordings of the neo-classical Third and Fourth Symphonies. Koch regarded the latter, the Sinfonia seria (1952 53, rev 1962), as the most important of his six symphonies and its gravity is certainly impressively memorable – but then so is the Adagio espressivo slow movement of No 3 (1948). All four works are hugely attractive and idiomatically played, and I recommend this disc unreservedly.