Aaron Rabushka wrote:

>Brian's cogency can often be elusive for both performers and listeners.
>Which #3 have you been listening to?

Lionel Friend cond. the BBC Symph Orch. (Hyperion CDA 66334)

>...am listening to (and maybe I should bite my tongue here) the Aries
>LP version, credited to "The Lisbon Conservatory Orchestra" with "Peter
>Michaels" conducting.  Aries credits are often bogus, and I'm not sure
>who's actually playing.  They seem to have the work's progress firmly in
>hand, and they always seem to know where they're going, as strange a path
>as it may be.

Maybe it's just this.

>It's hard to pick up any Brian symphony and not find prominent xylophone
>and glockenspiel lines that are indispensible to the work's progress.  The
>xylophone cadenza in the scherzo of the Gothic symphony is breathtaking.
>I would also recommend a gander at #12 (again in the Aries series).

I see this accompanied by the #4 on Marco Polo, with Leaper conducting
the CSR Symph Orch.  (8.223447).  As to LPs:  my needle's been out of
commission for years.

>...not conversant at all with the Marco Polo series, and I've heard mixed
>reviews ...Brian is a highly original and individual composer, worthy of
>more attention than he has gotten.

So I keep hearing; probably why I haven't just given up.  According to Steve
Schwartz:

>...if all you've heard is early Brian, then you're in for a surprise with
>the later works - incredibly concentrated and tight.  Try the Symphony No.
>21.

Apparently this is not available, even via special order, alas.

Would 17 & 32 do?  Are 20 & 25 close enough?  (Both Marco Polo CDs that are
out and about: 8.223481 and 8.223731, respectively)

With thanks for the roadsigns,

Bert B