First recorded more than 30 years ago by no less a partnership than Fritz Reiner and the Chicago SO (RCA, never released in the UK), Mysterious mountain is the Second Symphony by that prolific American figure, Alan Hovhaness (to date there are, staggeringly, 63 others—someone should inform Marco Polo!). There's a strongly modal feel to Hovhaness's sturdy yet serene chordal string-writing (beefed-up VW in Tallis Fantasia mode is the nearest description I can think of), against which, in the opening Andante con moto particularly, exotic woodwind melismata clearly reveal the influence of the composer's Armenian roots. Some healthy (and impressively sustained) fugal bustle in the central movements is on hand to provide the necessary variety. Lousadzak, in effect a one movement piano concerto, even more unashamedly revels in the composer's ancestral heritage, and there's no denying that the quasi-improvisatory feel of much of the solo part casts its own potent spell. In the last resort, a certain lack of emotional contrast and sheer incident means that this music will not be to everyone's taste, but, with both works clocking in at around 16 minutes apiece, neither really outstays its welcome, I'm happy to say.
Another Second Symphony comprises the remainder, the Elegiac of Lou Harrison. Some 33 years in gestation (according to the composer, initial sketches date from 1942), this is a fivemovement work of no mean stature. Fascinating influences abound: the piquant, often tintinnabulatory nature of Harrison's scoring reflects his lifelong preoccupation with Indonesian gamelan music (Harrison has written extensively for this exotic medium); the Ruggles of Sun-treader stalks across the jagged landscape of the fourth movement, ''Praises for Michael the Archangel''; and in the touching final movement, ''The Sweetness of Epicurus'', there's an open-air harmonic sense and naive serenity strongly akin to such radiant American masterpieces as Copland's Appalachian Spring and Barber's Knoxville: Summer of 1915. The score bears a dedication to the memory of Serge and Natalie Koussevitzky, and, by way of a deeply-felt tribute, Harrison incorporates some extremely beautiful writing for the double-bass in the central movement (the great Russian maestro was himself a virtuoso on that instrument). Indeed, the symphony as a whole exudes a meditative rapture that I have come to find increasingly affecting.
Performances and recordings are consistently top-notch, and I surprised myself by enjoying this disc a great deal. Anyone caught up by the recent Gorecki / Tavener cult could well find themselves similarly entranced here.'