Miaskovsky collectors will have to have the Marco Polo disc. They will acquire a less passionate account of the Seventh Symphony in the process (and one only marginally more refined in terms of orchestral playing and recording). But they will need it for the sake of the tumultuous Tenth Symphony. This work, not otherwise available on record, is accurately described in Soviet sources as ''an individualistic concept of pessimism realized through expressionistic images''. It is also realized through a highly chromaticized F minor tonality, reminiscent at times of early Schoenberg, and a genuine single-movement structure, with an ABA 'slow movement' embedded between exposition and development.

This is a piece which Persimfans, the famous experimental conductorless orchestra, premiered in March 1928, with unhappy results which may have had something to do with Miaskovsky's subsequent stylistic retrenchment. It sorts out the Slovak Philharmonic, too, and it may be that there is a finer Russian performance waiting in the wings. Until such time, however, this is a more than useful stopgap.

Gramophone, July 1989