Nowadays there is not much doubt of Stenhammar's standing as the finest Swedish composer after Berwald, though I have to say that when I lived in Sweden in the mid-1950s you wouldn't have known it. He was undergoing a neglect comparable only to that of Bax and Elgar in England at that time. Anyway it has been gratifying to watch his slow and steady emergence from the shadows not only in Sweden but abroad. The present issue is a tremendous bargain even by the standards this new label has set itself. The Serenade is arguably Stenhammar's masterpiece. In its Overture the writing is vibrant and luminous, full of subtly changing textures and colours, and like the finale is of symphonic proportions. Apparently Stenhammar toyed at one stage with the idea of adding the word selvaggio or ''wild'' to the title of the Scherzo, the mercurial centrepiece of the whole work, which is played with captivating spirit here. Stig Westerberg's 20-year-old recording comes up very fresh indeed though the upper strings don't have quite the same bloom as the Gothenburg under Neeme Jarvi. The latter offer the charming Reverenza movement that Stenhammar eventually rejected but nothing else by way of fill-up. The playing throughout is ardent, sensitive and vital.
The Matrix reissue offers two additional pieces, most notably Janos Solyom's brilliant (and to my mind still unsurpassed) account of the Second Piano Concerto with the Munich Philharmonic, sounding as if it were recorded yesterday. It is strongly indebted to Saint-Saens, and the Scherzo has a Mendelssohnian effervescence and delicacy. All four movements have an effortless charm and freshness of melodic invention. The early and endearing if Wagnerian Florez och Blanzeflor (''Flower and Whiteflower'') to words of Oscar Levertin, finely sung by Ingvar Wixell, is the admirable makeweight. An altogether indispensable issue that deserves the widest currency.'