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Thanks for the suggestions, but it still seems pretty sparse. Does anyone have any idea why the oboe seems to have been eschewed by the Romantics when it was well represented in the Classical and Baroque and enjoyed a decent revival in the 20th century?

The last 2 are arguably incomparable.

Incomparable? I've often told my daughter that my (rather poor) piano playing has been compared to Rubenstein! Someone once heard me play and said "Rubenstein you're not!". 

(Old jokes never die, I know because I retell them so often).

I'll give a vote to the Hummel A Minor and B Minor concertos. Though he's most often compared to Mozart or Mendelssohn I find the power and virtuosity of these concertos reminiscent of Beethoven. As Beethoven was a bridge between Haydn and Brahms, Hummel was a bridge between Mozart and Mendelssohn/Chopin. So I always think of him as a parallel to Beethoven.

Interesting side note on Hummel piano concertos. This is from the NY Times, December 9, 1893 (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=950DE4DE113BEF33A2575AC0A9649D94629ED7CF)

THE SYMPHONY SOCIETY.; An Interesting Revival of a Hummel Piano Concerto.

No doubt many persons were surprised when they read the announcement that Vladimir de Pachmann would play one of Johann Nepomuk Hummel's piano concertos at yesterday's afternoon concert of the Symphony Society. Hummel's name is unknown to the average music lover of to-day, and it was only the initiated who could perceive a reason for the peculiar little Russian's choice.

A short while back we had a topic on unusual solo instruments used in concertos. I would like to now add a much more conventional instrument that seemingly gets little respect - the oboe. It's one of my favorite instruments, with it's beautiful, plaintive, almost human voice like quality. It was quite popular as a concerto instrument with baroque composers (usually in the form of oboe d'amore) with a large number of wonderful concertos for the instrument by Vivaldi, Albinoni, Marcello, etc... + Bach's wonderful oboe solo concerto and his double oboe,violin concerto. Handel wrote 3 oboe concertos and there are many other baroque examples, but then it seems to peter out. Mozart has his oboe concerto but composers seem to already be losing interest. Except for Mozart's, post baroque oboe concertos are few. There are a bunch by Lebrun (Ludwg August) who was almost an exact contemporary of Mozart (1752-90).  Other contemporaries of Mozart who wrote oboe concertos were Kurt Meier, Ernst Eichner, Ignaz Holzbauer, Giuseppe Ferlendis, Leopold Hofman. Also CPE & JC Bach have oboe concertos plus Dittersdorf, Cimarosa.  Haydn has his concerto for oboe and trumpet. There's a recording of Czech oboe concertos by Fiala, Krommer and Zach.

It seems to have made a minor comeback in the 20th century, there are significant concertos by Vaughan Williams, Malcolm Arnold, Elliot Carter,Richard Strauss, Bohuslav Martinu, Holst's Fugual concerto for flute & oboe, and a double concerto for oboe and harp by Lutoslawski. There's also a concertino for oboe by Greek composer Nikos Skallkottas. Other 20th century examples include Gordon Jacob (who wrote 2 I believe),  Eugene Goosens, Pawel Sydor, Marco Aurelio Yano, Harald Saeverud, Jouni Kaipainen, Christopher Gunning, Alan Rawsthorne, William Alwyn (for oboe, harp & strings).

But the great romantic composers seemed to have almost entirely ignored the instrument. Can anyone recommend some great romantic oboe concertos. There is a concerto by Bellini which has been recorded, but no late romantic examples I can think of. Rimsky Korsakov has Variations for oboe and military band. August Klughardt has a concert piece for oboe & orch. Ignaz Moscheles wrote a concertante for flute, oboe & orch. And theres a Concert piece for oboe & orch by Julius Rieitz.  Pretty slim pickings it seems. Are there any great romantic oboe concertos waiting to be discovered? Any opinions on why the oboe fell into such disuse in the 19th century?

Well, obviously, yes. The point I was making was that its reputation is well established - its monumentality is hardly unkown. By comparison, great symphonies such as Draeseke 3 or Rufinatscha 6 are almost completely unsung.

I'm not so sure I agree it's not unsung. It may be well known by the members of this group, but none of the Brian symphonies gets much play. Until the Marco Polo/Naxos series there were not lots of recordings of Brian's symphonies. (and except for some additions by EMI and Lyrita there still aren't)  A pretty sophisticated friend (who mostly listens to jazz, but goes to a fair number of classical concerts in NY every year) was telling me about attending a recent performance of Mahler's 8th and I mentioned Brian's Gothic and he had never heard of the work or the composer.

I guess it depends on where you cutoff sung vs unsung, but Raff seems to be pretty much considered unsung from the posts on the forum but he is far better represented in the catalog than Brian (A quick Amazon search reveals 40 CDs for Brian, mostly the MP symphones and 167 for Raff. I grant that he's a better composer as well, but my point is that he is certainly not less well known to most of the public than Brian).

Yes, the Gothic surely qualifies - although it's hardly unsung. Its monumental size is widely known. Underperformed, perhaps?

It's underperformed because it's hard to get enough liquor to get that many musicians together in one place. 

I don't think anyone has yet mentioned Harvergal Brian's Sym #1 'Gothic'. If that doesn't count as monumental, I'm not sure what does. As a reminder of the forces involved, from the Havergal Brian Society (http://www.havergalbrian.org/):

Part one [1]:
2 piccolos (1 also flute), 3 flutes (1 also alto flute), 2 oboes,  oboe d'amore, cor anglais,  bass oboe, Eb clarinet, 2  Bb clarinets, basset horn, bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, contrabassoon, 6 horns, Eb cornet, 4 trumpets in F, bass trumpet, 3 tenor trombones, 2 tubas, 2 sets (min 3 drums) timpani, 2 harps, organ, celesta, min 8 percussion:  glockenspiel, xylophone, 2 bass drums, 3 side drums, tambourine, pair cymbals, gong, triangle;  strings [say 16.16.12.10.8]

Part two [1]:
Soprano, alto, tenor, bass soloists, large children's choir, 2 large mixed double choruses [in practice 4 large SATB choirs]
orchestra: 2 piccolos (1 also flute), 6 flutes (1 also alto flute), 6 oboes (1 also oboe d'amore, 1 also bass oboe), 2 cors anglais, 2 Eb clarinets (1 also Bb clarinet), 4  Bb clarinets, 2 basset horns, 2 bass clarinets, contrabass clarinet, 3 bassoons, 2 contrabassoons, 8 horns, 2 Eb cornets, 4 trumpets in F, bass trumpet, 3 tenor trombones, bass trombone, contrabass trombone, 2 euphoniums, 2 tubas, 2 sets (min 3 [in practice 4] drums) timpani, 2 harps, organ, celesta, min 18 percussion:  glockenspiel, xylophone, 2 bass drums, 3 side drums, long drum, 2 tambourines, 6 pairs cymbals, gong, thunder machine [not thunder sheet], tubular bells, chimes, chains, 2 triangles, birdscare;   strings (20.20.16.14.12)
4 off stage groups: each containing 2 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 tenor trombones, set (min 3 drums) of timpani
(in summary: 32 wind, 24 on stage brass, 24 off stage brass, 6 timpanists, 18 percussion, 4 keyboards and harps, 82 strings - total orchestra c190 players, plus adult choir of min 500 [assumes largely professionals], children's choir of 100, 4 soloists = c800)

It takes from 95-110 minutes to perform.

There are several recordings of a choral work of his (a setting of Tantum Ergo), one by the Westminster Cathedral Choir, one by the Schola Cantorum of Oxford, one with the Chapel Choir at Triinty and multiple others. It is included on enough collections of French choral music that it must be something of a mini-standard, although I have no specific recollection of it. I have the Schola Cantorum CD (which is paired with the Faure Requiem and other works by Faure) so I will give it a listen.

His Pastoral Suite is on Naxos. There is also an old CD on Swedish label Big Ben with a ballet, Saint John's Eve. However, I don't think it is available otherwise than second-hand.

Saint John's Eve is available for mp3 download from Amazon for under $4.

Miklos Rosza  - "Spelbound Concerto" for theremin and Orchestra

The Spellbound Concerto is for piano and orchestra. The actual score has a theremin in it though I don't believe the 'normal' version of the concerto has one (there's also one or two other versions as well as one for two pianos and orchestra).

The original is for piano and orchestra (albeit with a prominent theremin part), there is also an orchestra only version. However this CD by  Lydia Kavina lists a further arrangement for Theremin & Chamber Ensemble (1946)

http://www.moderecords.com/catalog/199kavina.html

The notes indicate that this is a Rosza arrangement.

For anyone who wants to record internet radio, I use a fabulous product called ReplayAV (used to be called Replay Radio, and frankly I liked the original version better. They've added a bunch of bells and whistles I never use, but the problems of feature creep are not for this forum).

Anyway it is like a Tivo for internet radio. You can schedule broadcasts you wish to capture regularly or on an ad hoc basis and it records them and saves them to your hard drive. It also supports conversion to the format of your choice (mp3 at different quality settings, some others). You can also have it automatically delete programs older than a certain date to preserve disc space.  They have a large db of existing internet stations or you can manually enter your own. It's pretty straightforward to use and I highly recommend it.

Anyway, more info can be found here:

http://www.applian.com/replay-av/index.php

Just transmitting an enthusiasm (spurred by listening to his works this morning), opening a thread for any other members who can expand on his life and music or share their enthusiasm for Alfven's work. I did do a quick search and noticed he hadn't been discussed here before and thought it was about time.

I have been spending the morning re-listening to Hugo Alfven (1872-1960). The music is wonderful, especially the 5 symphonies and the three Swedish Rhapsodies (of which, the 1st is probably his most popular and one of the few of his works that could be considered 'mainstream'). Gorgeous melodies and rich, lush orchestrations.  I believe that most of the orchestral works are recorded, but the Hugo Alfven Society (http://www.alfvensallskapet.se/Everk.htm) also lists several large scale choral/vocal works, a few chamber works and a collection of songs of which I am aware of only a few having been recorded (Sterling has also recorded several cantatas and BIS has recorded several of the songs and smaller choral works), most notably "The Lord's Prayer" for chorus, soloists and orchestra. There is also a recording of his violin sonata. I haven't heard either. I will be adding them to my collection.

Another unusual solo instrument which is best know for the fascination Messiaen had for it is the Ondes Martenot, which also has, beside the works Messiaen included it in, several concertos:

Marcel Lundowski - Concerto for Ondes Martenot and orchestra
Bernard Wisson - Kyriades, double concerto for ondes Martenot, piano, string orchestra & percussion
André Jolivet - Concerto for Ondes Martenot & orch
Jean Jacques Charpentier - Concerto for Ondes Martenot & orch
Jan Erik Mikalsen - Concerto for Ondes Martenot & orch

And several composers wrote chamber and solo works for the instrument.

Closely related to the Ondes is the Theremin, which Edgar Varese used several times and for which there are several concertos as well:

Edgar Varese  - "Ecuatorial" for theremin and orchestra
Miklos Rosza  - "Spelbound Concerto" for theremin and Orchestra
Lydia Kavina - Concerto for Theremin & Orch
Anis Fuleihan - Concerto for Theremin & Orch (recorded by Clara Rockmore with Leopold Stokowski & NYPO no less)
Linda Kernohan -  Concerto for Theremin & Chamber Orch
Tatiana Nazarova-Methner - "Vietnam Album" for theremin and orch
Olga Neuwirth - "Baehlamms Fest" for Theremin and orch
Joseph Schillinger - "First Airfonic Suite" for theremin and orch
Howard Shore - "Ed Wood' Suite for theremin and orch

I also just saw in the new release list from the current Gramophone a new requiem by David Bednall. I know nothing about the composer.