While Shostakovich appeared to dominate the Russian-Soviet musical scene as observed from the West, his pupils were often more comfortable with the norms of Stalinist culture. Among those who escaped censure in the ‘anti-formalist’ purge of February 1948 was his Azerbaijani protégé Kara Karayev (1918‑82). Adept at the folkish stuff the authorities would have preferred from his teacher in the wake of the Second World War, Karayev nevertheless allowed undigested gobbets of a certain Eighth Symphony to dominate the climax of his symphonic poem Leyla and Mejnun (1947). An otherwise 19th-century piece, it won him a Stalin Prize.

Two of the other scores featured here have balletic connections. And if Don Quixote (1960) sounds more formulaic, that’s because these ‘symphonic engravings’ do indeed derive from a film. Sample track 14 if you can, a kitschy Soviet take on Bizet’s toreadors which seems to belong in some sword-and-sandal epic. Should that not deter you, you’ll discover a sequence of vivid (if derivative) vignettes and quietly affecting character studies. The disc’s concluding ‘Lullaby’ comes from The Path of Thunder (1957), a socialist realist ballet about love in apartheid South Africa for which the composer apparently delved into African genres. That’s not much evident in this delicate, calm-before-the-storm number. The Chandos selection is unashamedly escapist or, in the conductor’s case, nostalgic. Karayev’s modernist side is barely hinted at.

As with a number of composers from the old Soviet bloc, you might have come across some of this material before, recognition being complicated by the vagaries of transliteration. Kara Karayev, Karajev or Karáev is also Gara Garayev and even Qara Qarayev. The claim made in Chandos’s booklet that these are premiere recordings is certainly wide of the mark. Gramophone’s reviewer condemned a Czech-made account of The Seven Beauties suite (1949) as early as December 1952 and there have been several dodgy notices since. Today’s Naxos catalogue offers cheaper versions of all the chosen repertoire. But where Dmitry Yablonsky brings professional rigour to his rehearse-record sessions with the Russian PO, Karabits has programmed at least some of this music in his UK concerts. His affection is evident in the spacious and detailed treatment of lyrical content, while the brasher ceremonials are delivered with precise rhythmic definition and unhurried verve. Should your ear tire of Karayev’s battery of percussion, that’s no fault of the recording itself which, like the Naxos disc previously cited, is produced by Andrew Walton.

Excellent news that Chandos will be recording further Soviet-era rarities with the Bournemouth team in opulent surround-sound, though whether this expert, somewhat innocuous first instalment will merit frequent listening only you can decide. It might be helpful to forget Shostakovich (except for the Shostakovich of the Jazz Suites). Karayev’s confections more usually resemble those of his Armenian-born neighbour Aram Khachaturian. Sadly none of the tunes hits the spot quite as surely as the Adagio from Spartacus.