Along with the many other Soviet composers who are deemed insufficiently dissident, Dmitry Kabalevsky’s reputation, despite the craft and quality of his utilitarian output, has been crushed beneath the wheels of the commie-bashing critical bandwagon so it’s high time that his serious work was reappraised.

His breezy First Cello Concerto, Opus 9, is popular among today’s young players on the competition circuit, but the serious Second Cello Concerto, Opus 77, is rarely heard, and that is quite a shame. It is a warmly expressive and accessible work with a distinctive mood entirely of its own.

The concerto’s brooding introduction eventually gives way to a nervous, agitated argument that has an obvious socio-political subtext with furtive glances over the shoulder. The mood carries over to the Presto marcato movement with its inevitable Russian carnival grotesqueries and interrupts the finale’s periods of calm resignation. Written in 1964, one senses in the background the dreadful possibility of Cold War apocalypse or the mundane fear of the dreaded knock on the door.

Leonard Elschenbroich justifies his advocacy by digging in deep with bold, emotive gestures and precise articulation. Litton and the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra provide a finely graded and polished accompaniment.

Prokofiev’s Cello Sonata in C Major,...