There’s no better introduction to the productive tensions that have fuelled Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’s career as a composer than O magnum mysterium (1960). Eight short movements, well within the capabilities of the school choir and orchestra for which they were written, alternate carol settings which elaborate the initial, chant-like monody with instrumental sonatas in a more “international” modern style. But these relatively straightforward movements form the collective prelude to a 15-minute fantasia for organ in which the young composer threw down an uncompromising challenge to performer and listeners alike. Maxwell Davies’s own 1962 recording of the carols and sonatas was – at long last – transferred to CD as part of the “Portrait” set issued by Decca (A/04). But the organ fantasia was not included, so this new recording – performed with a high degree of competence by all concerned – is even more welcome than it would otherwise be.

As well as the three short organ voluntaries (1974) which were a fairly early product of the composer’s flight from swinging London and absorption in things Scottish, the disc is notable for the premiere recording of the Evening Canticles which Davies wrote for St Mary’s Cathedral in 2004. Following on from the Mass and Missa Parvula written for Westminster Cathedral (2002), these are boldly sculpted conceptions, using the language of extended tonality that Davies has consistently cultivated for many years, and which works particularly well when long melodic lines combine to move dramatically between strong dissonance and relative consonance. The Edinburgh choristers, well trained by Matthew Owens, make light of the music’s demands, and the St Mary’s Cathedral recordings couple abundant atmosphere with a fair degree of textural clarity.