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So many finds in 2014 - it used to be one was lucky to discover one unfamiliar composer a year - now it is more like one a week.

To single out one, I would pick the piano concerto by Nicholas Tcherepnin. I have long been familiar with the piano concertos of his better-known son (especially the second, which I love), but coming across one by the father was a surprise. It is a striking work, in one movement (resembling the Rimsky-Korsakov concerto in that respect), with a pretty strenuous piano part.

I clipped off the opening phrase and uploaded it to my phone so it plays when a text message arrives. So if you can recognise that pgrase, and you suddenly hear it in a train or somewhere, you know who is in the vicinity, c'est moi.

Third movement of Ives's fourth violin sonata. Actual indication is "Allegro (con slugarocko)".

Problems of citing from memory!

No-one has mentioned Charles Ives's Violin Sonata (I can't remember which of them, possibly the third), which has the indication for the 2nd movement "Andante con slugarocko".

I recall that the Hyperion CD of the piano concerto got very lukewarm reviews when it came out. Quite undesreved in my opinion; I find it a very well-constructed, original and memorable piece.

I would suggest Ferdinand Ries ... To me, much more interesting than Rufinatscha.

Also available on Spotify, incidentally.

This release even got a positive review in the Guardian ...

I have an old LP of Stokowski conducting the "London Stadium Orchestra" - good luck tracing the history of THAT band!

erm. not sure I have a fair notion of what "sounds Armenian" really sounds like, authentically, anyway.

That's very easy - it means inflected with either Armenian folk music or church music. Armenian church music is particularly distinctive - the melodic shapes used by Hovhaness are cribbed directly from it.

On another note, i completely agree with Mark re Elmas's concertos.

I am just giving the 1st piano concerto a second listen as I post. I wouldn't compare it to Chopin - it's more reminiscent of Liszt or even Grieg. Then Elmas did idolise Liszt. Highly romantic music! Both the 1st and 2nd concertos are on YT; I have not looked for the 3rd.

I was wondering - is it the first piano concerto written by an Armenian? Not that it sounds Armenian or even Russian in its musical language.

Similar to the old description of some Soviet composers as "Tchaikovsky and benzadrine".

Not really a new recording, but I notice that the performance by Robert Hosselet with the Belgium National Orchestra and Rene Defossez, which was in the archive here but I think got deleted, has been re-released by Naxos. At the moment, not as an actual CD. I was listening to it the other day; lovely late romantic concerto with a very distinctive opening.

Agreed. Fuchs' achievement lies predominantly in the field of chamber music - which means, in my view, that he will probably never 'have his day'. The symphonies are enjoyable, but not great works: there are finer unsung late-nineteenth century symphonists. So I think Fuchs will always remain a minority pursuit.
Having said which, I'd forgotten the PC. Now that's a really fine piece...

It is, and was reviewed rather dismissively when the Hyperion recording appeared. But it was his chamber music that first attracted me to Fuchs, and I agree that such as indeed his pre-eminent metier.

That said, I have been enjoying the orchestral serenades recently, especially No. 3.

When did you last hear a recent broadcast work by a major contemporary composer subtitled "tone poem"? It's the same with concertos - it seems no-one writes a piece called "Violin Concerto No 1" any more - it gets called "Fractured Night" or something of that kind instead.

I rarely encounter tone poems in concert these days. Unless those short pieces by modern composers qualify as tone poems. 99% of those are destined to be the unsung works of tomorrow -- eminently forgettable.

I greatly doubt if many contemporary composers would ever use the term "tone poem" ...