Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Choir and Orchestra/Vasily PetrenkoNaxos 8.572396 ****

Shostakovich's First Symphony, premièred in Leningrad in 1926, when the composer was 19, is a graduation piece that must have wowed the examiners. It certainly made the composer's international name. Bruno Walter conducted it in Berlin in 1927, Leopold Stokowski in Philadelphia a year later, and Alban Berg sent a note of congratulations after hearing the work in Vienna. His Third, subtitled The First of May, and with a choral finale setting a revolutionary text, has never been as well regarded. Quite apart from the jingoistic words (the first US performances ditched the choir), the brittle modernism of the music has never won favour. Vasily Petrenko treats both pieces persuasively, in the manner of venerable masterpieces, bringing suavity to the cheekiness of the First and fervour to the Third.

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