The Octet offers an imaginative rethinking of that wind combination’s sonorous possibilities. Through most of the first movement, he uses the pair of horns to anchor a full-bodied mid-range sonority, establishing a sort of foundation timbre against which treble woodwinds, solo and unison, offer a nice play of textural contrasts. Three-bar phrase lengths—or, perhaps, single measures of 9/8 time, since I’ve not seen the score—bring an uplift that carries through both the Scherzo proper and its smoother trio. The building of textures again comes into play in the Adagio: the theme sweetly offered by the clarinet eventually emerges in an expansive, full-throated restatement. The Finale’s main subject has a cheerful, unforced moto perpetuo feel, set off by a syncopated second group that actually moves faster; there’s a nifty detour into a remote key at 2:41.

Although Reinecke has fewer instruments at his disposal in the three-movement Sextet than in the Octet, he finds the resources for a similar highlighting and contrasting of textures. The horn gets more lyrical opportunities here, however, and Jonathan Menkis intones those solos with velvety smoothness. The central Adagio molto is the score’s emotional center as well; heartfelt and mostly somber at the start, it abruptly turns chipper at 3:04.

What is offered here as Von der Wiege bis zum Grabe is a selection of twelve of Reinecke’s original set of twenty-four solo piano pieces, arranged by Ernesto Köhler for flute and piano…There’s no denying the commitment of either flutist Fenwick Smith or dexterous pianist Hugh Hinton…The sound quality however is excellent, rendering the wind ensembles with full-throated depth, although once or twice the clarinets’ low range threatens to hit the mikes hard. In Von der Wiege bis zum Grabe, the flute is crisply etched against the piano.

These wind ensembles date from the last two decades of Reinecke’s long and productive life. They show the influence of the German Romantics and of Mozart’s later wind serenades. Anyone who enjoys the Mozart works or Richard Strauss’s wind compositions will take pleasure in these, though they lack the harmonic innovations of the later master and the sheer genius of the earlier. The Wind Sextet is undoubtedly the more accomplished of the two works, but both it and the earlier Wind Octet have enormous charm. In the Sextet, Reinecke darkens a standard woodwind quintet with the addition of a second horn, creating a colorful palette that he exploits skillfully. The Octet is even more concerned with sonority, the pairs of clarinets, horns, and bassoons often providing a richly variegated foundation to support flute and oboe filigree. There is nothing especially profound here, just warm summer evening, open pavilion kind of fare. Given the fairly sparse wind ensemble repertoire, it is hard to figure why they are not more often performed.

Von der Wiege bis zum Grabe­­ was written as a suite for piano, in the manner of Schumann, tracing a life from birth to apotheosis. This is salon music for domestic consumption and Reinecke tailors his piece precisely to his market’s fondness for sentimentality. Mercifully for modern sensibilities, only eight of the 16 pieces were arranged for flute and piano by flutist Ernesto Köhler. I was particularly relieved that the finale, “Upward to the Stars,” was omitted. Smith and Hinton play the pieces with great flair and conviction, but this is altogether too maudlin.

For all that, I am pleased that Naxos has made this 1993 Et’cetera release available again. Comprised of non-principal members of the Boston Symphony—the principals perform as the Boston Symphony Chamber Players—the ensemble’s excellence speaks volumes about the talent depth in that orchestra. These wind ensembles were recorded again in 1994, by Ensemble Villa Musica for MDG 304478, during what was, judging from the many reviews in Fanfare, a mid-1990s mini-surge of interest in the composer’s works. David Johnson, who reviewed both of these, thought the intimacy of the MDG performances better caught the works’ spirit. I prefer the marginally superior warmth and energy of the Naxos—and the price.