Richard Hickox’s 1989 Philharmonia version of A Sea Symphony (Virgin, 8/90 – nla) was an energetic but disappointingly bluff, loose-limbed affair. Thankfully, this Chandos remake (captured live at the Barbican last June, with a “patch” session the following day) shows a significant advance in sheer conviction, symphonic grip and authority. Granted, the tremendous opening call-to-arms (“I nearly fell off the rostrum,” recalled VW of the 1910 Leeds Festival world premiere) falls some way short of the shattering impact of Boult’s legendary Decca recording (7/94), still the interpretative touchstone more than half a century on; nor, with the notable exception of that movingly hushed closing paragraph from fig Q or 8'41", is the slow movement’s vein of awestruck contemplation always as potently tapped as one would wish. However, tension levels rise in the flashing Scherzo, which is negotiated with swaggering relish, and the tingles surface in abundance for the boldly expansive, visionary finale, where the soul’s voyage into eternity at last finds everyone firing on all cylinders, not least soprano Susan Gritton and baritone Gerald Finley (ravishingly tender in their ecstatic, almost operatic duet “O we can wait no longer”).

Hickox coaxes some finely drilled work thoughout from his massed LSO forces, and the main work is preceded by an affectionate account of the Wasps Overture. The snag remains that somewhat intractable Barbican acoustic, which takes its toll in terms of enticing bloom and atmosphere (I also had to set the volume higher than usual). Fans of Hickox’s continuing (and, to my mind, variable) VW symphony cycle for Chandos will doubtless want to investigate. When push comes to shove, though, this latest Sea Symphony doesn’t challenge the supremacy of the 1953 Boult, Handley (CfP, 2/89R) or Haitink (EMI, 1/90R).