Ives: Three Places in New England, Ruggles: Sun Treader, etc.

Originally recorded in 1970, this is a welcome reissue of superb performances by the young Michael Tilson Thomas in his Boston Symphony days. The Ives is one of his best-known pieces and the crack orchestra plays it to the hilt. Ruggles's Suntreader is the work of another American loner, full of stark contrasts and uninhibited sound explorations--with a brass and percussion opening that'll make you sit up. Piston is often written off as an academic craftsman but his Second Symphony, like most of his works, makes such stereotyping patently absurd. He may not have been as idiosyncratic as Ruggles or Ives, but he was a creative composer whose poised, warmly gracious music should be better known. The three-movement Second Symphony is typical Piston in its classic framework, well-molded melodies and orchestration, and the way it slides effortlessly between the lyrical and the dramatic. It's hard to imagine better performances of these important American works. --Dan Davis