Brian Newbould’s sensitive completion of Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony in four movements has been recorded several times before, but here it comes generously coupled with a bold orchestration of the Death and the Maiden Quartet, quite different from the adaptation for strings made by Mahler. Newbould has used the fragment of a third-movement Scherzo that Schubert left, and added various related fragments from other sources. For the finale, like others attempting a completion he chooses the B minor Entr’acte from the Rosamunde music, which is just about viable.

JoAnn Falletta draws polished playing from the Buffalo Philharmonic, specially impressive for wind solos, but this is an account of the first movements that lacks the mystery that this B minor work can regularly conjure up, admirable as the playing is. When it comes to the added movements, it has to be admitted that they do not match very happily. The result is a fascinating exercise without being a work that deserves to be brought into the regular repertory. The Unfinished as it stands certainly wins the test of time.

Listening to the genuine Schubert of those two first movements after the Death and the Maiden orchestration brings home the difference between real and imitation Schubert. The orchestration of Andy Stein is vigorous and is convincingly played, but it is coarse next to the symphony. The use of woodwind solos is not always successful, and the device of using different wind sections in a block Brucknerian way is hardly convincing. Yet, as I say, it makes for a lively experience, and provides a generous coupling for the completed Symphony No 8. Good, clean sound.