An invaluable new recording of substantial works from an important American voice Marvin David Levy is best known as composer of Mourning Becomes Electra, the riveting Gothic opera revived to great acclaim this past season at New York City Opera and Seattle Opera. Yet if his most celebrated work is decidedly secular, Jewish themes have formed at least part of Levy’s oeuvre, as this release in the Milken Archive series demonstrates.

Premièred in 1977 and revised extensively in 1999, the cantata Canto de los Marranos was inspired by the plight of the 15th-century Spanish Jews who escaped persecution by professing conversion to Christianity while continuing to practice their own religion in secret.

The composer draws upon Ladino (a variant mix of Hebrew and 15th-century Castilian Spanish) as well as Latin texts, the duality in the source material and musical motives reflecting the religious conflict at the work’s core. The Latin Our Father is set to swirling haunted figures and edgy percussion, followed by yearning string phrases for the Jewish passages. Levy’s artful handling of the texts is done with imaginative flair and he deftly conveys the collision of Catholic and Judaic material, with the sinuous quotation of the Spanish song Benedicho su nombre in the final section particularly inspired. Ana Maria Martinez’s voice hardens at time under pressure yet her quick vibrato and vibrant soprano bring great life and sensitivity to the words. At 21 minutes, Canto seems a little extended, not helped by Jorge Mester’s anodyne, at times listless conducting. The distant recording further muffles the music’s impact.

The detailed booklet notes do an exhaustive job of untangling the complex history of Masada, the fortress where the forces of ancient Israel famously held off the Roman army. Originally performed under Antal Dorati and the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington with Richard Tucker as the soloist and George London as narrator, Masada was heard in revised form in 1987 with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Margaret Hillis. Levy, a compulsive reviser, here presents a third version, shortened and with the narration eliminated.

Masada moves from a brooding opening with a slow march into Levy’s brand of soar-ing, non-treacly lyricism. This new, tighter version benefits by losing the narrator, and the text, based on Yitzhak Lamdan’s epic 1927 poem, is set with skill. Part 2 has the more consistently inspired music, including a lovely episode for women’s chorus. Richard Troxell’s dry and strained tenor isn’t always balm to the ears yet he sings with clear diction and ardent expression.

As with Canto, the playing here has a lukewarm marmoreal quality. Although the work’s climax with percussion battery and chorus in full cry behind the soloist is effective, Masada needs much greater grip and incisive direction to make an impact. Yoel Levi’s conducting lacks fire and the lifeless choral singing indicates that the Ernst Senff Choir has fallen on hard times. It’s too bad the Milken Archive couldn’t have licensed the 1987 Chicago performances, which were widely hailed at the time. Texts and translations are provided but in such comically microbial print they’re almost impossible to make out. Shir Shel Moshe was commissioned by New York’s Park Avenue Synagogue , while Levy was frantically finishing Mourning Becomes Electra for the Met première in 1964. Levy is characteristically self-effacing about the music claiming he ‘didn’t have time to go into something more complex’. Yet the spontaneous inspiration of the six excerpts heard here belie his diffidence, crafted with characteristic care for words and imaginatively varied with much lovely music and fervent expression. The performance of the BBC Singers is solid but a bit whitebread and tenor Vale Rideout likewise sings with sensitivity and firm tone if without a febrile, cantorial colour.

With Mourning Becomes Electra, Levy’s masterwork, amazingly, still awaiting its first recording, this entry in the Milken series is invaluable. Despite the uneven performances, the disc helps to round out a portrait of one of our finest and most consistently interesting (and inexplicably underecorded) composers.