Another Third for your consideration
Saburo Moroi.
Who? you say... Japanese composer, studied in 1930s Germany, nothing ethnically Japanese about his Third symphony, which was completed in 1944 just before he was conscripted into the doomed Imperial army. He survived, but never wrote anything else of this stature.
It is a darkly powerful, moving work, a product of its time. Much more to my liking than any other Japanese symphony so far (and I've tried a few). A fine performance in its only recording by Takuo Yuasa and the Irish National SO on Naxos, one which I have now played
many times.
If I ever get to speak to Birmingham's Maestro Kazuki Yamada (well, you never know) I'll be asking for it. Goes very well with the Britten Violin Concerto which I played immediately before it this evening...