The Cello Concerto has not so far shared in this popularity. Composed during the summer of 1946, while Khachaturian was staying at the Soviet Composers' Union in Ivanovo, the work is well removed from the expressive directness of the Piano Concerto [ Naxos 8.550799 ] or the melodic richness of the Violin Concerto [ Naxos 8.570988 ]. Rather it continues the emotional unease of the wartime Second Symphony, though without that work's epic demeanour and with a greater focus on motivic development, qualities which, despite a successful launch in Moscow that November by the cellist Svyatoslav Knushevitsky, saw it fade into oblivion in the wake of the composer's denunciation at the conference presided over by Andrey Zhdanov just a year later. Perhaps the time is now right for this most resourceful of Khachaturian's orchestral works to receive its due.

The first movement starts with an ominous theme for strings over brass and timpani, which is presently taken up by the soloist over an animated accompaniment. The pace then slows and the solo clarinet introduces the brooding second theme, again taken up by the soloist against plaintive woodwind comments. A brief though forceful orchestral tutti announces the development section, which sets off with strenuous passage-work from the soloist against an imaginative orchestral backdrop. When this dies down it is to make way for the extensive and virtuosic cadenza, alluding to both of the main themes during its course. At length, the orchestra enters with the first theme and a modified reprise ensues, but this time the second theme heads into an athletic coda that sees the music through to a decisive close.

The second movement opens with atmospheric writing for woodwind and brass against swirling strings and harp, duly making way for the soloist to unfold a moodily sensuous theme that has undoubted folk-music inflections. Its ambivalent undertones are intensified in the restive orchestral passage that follows, but the soloist subsequently restores a measure of calm as the music winds down to an expectant pause.

From here the third movement begins with a bustling theme shared between soloist and orchestra, with the latter heading into a suavely expressive melody which has pronounced Eastern overtones. This continues for some while until a lively oboe phrase reintroduces the opening theme, soon taken up by the soloist in tandem with glancing asides from the woodwind and strings. Gaining steadily in momentum, this reaches the briefest of solo cadenzas before the tempo increases still further and a hectic transformation of the main theme on full orchestra brings the work's forceful but hardly affirmative ending.