Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra / Kenneth Woods
Macky Auditorium, Boulder, Colorado, USA, August 28th, 2021
Premiering a major addition to the symphonic repertoire during a worldwide pandemic is no mean achievement, with all the restrictions on travel for performers and audience that implies. The first outing of Philip Sawyers’ engaging and powerful Fifth Symphony (2109-21) by Kenneth Woods and the Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra should therefore be trumpeted from the rafters as a triumph over adversity, given in front of an appreciative live (and predominantly American) audience. While I was not able to attend the occasion in person—nor was the composer, by the way—Colorado MahlerFest have done us all a massive service in posting the video recording of the premiere in YouTube: just search for “Philip Sawyers Symphony 5” and you will find it.
Woods has been the director of the festival since 2016 and his rapport with its orchestra is well-established, as positive as that with the English String and Symphony Orchestras in the UK is tangible in performance. During his tenure in Boulder, the MahlerFest Orchesra have given several American premieres of contemporary works, including John McCabe’s wonderful Pilgrim for double string orchestra and David Matthews’ Romanza, to which Sawyers’ latest can now be added.
Playing for some 40 minutes, the Fifth Symphony is cast in five movements, the first of his to use that groundplan. (Nos 1 and 3 are in four movements, the Fourth in three and the Second in a single, unbroken span, though cast in five sections; it is not yet known how many the Sixth, still in planning will be in.) The music creates an immediately impressive sense of space right from the outset, underlined by a distinctly Brucknerian tread, which recurs at points throughout the substantial Moderato first movement. Sawyers was an orchestral violinist for decades (mostly with the Covent Garden Orchestra) and his orchestration is always precisely calculated and beautifully laid out for the players. There is a luminosity to the scoring in No 5 (once more, Sawyers deploys a standard orchestra not unlike that for Walton’s First Symphony without the second set of timpani), reminiscent of middle-period Shostakovich. For example, there are passages for unsupported high violins reminiscent of the Russian at times; at others Rubbra came to mind but without sounding like either compositional forebear.
The first of the two scherzi, Allegro, is as ‘English’ in tone as anything Sawyers has yet penned, though its rollicking momentum and almost Arnold-like sense of fun may not align to notions of British reserve. The heart of the work is the central Lento, a powerful and moving utterance inhabiting a dark (but not overly tragic) corner of the English pastoral tradition—with some darkly Brucknerian brass, splendidly blown by the Colorado players, for good measure. The gossamer Presto that follows brings respite from the Lento’s colouring, though not from its intensity, here re-focussed like a bird of prey scouring the countryside looking for its next kill. The powerful Allegro finale ties up the threads in compelling fashion, as one would expect, revisiting elements from earlier movements and culminating in a beautifully achieved, radiant final chord.
The reception for this premiere—really, as well-prepared and finely executed as any composer could wish for—was suitably enthusiastic. (It should be noted that the second half of this concert saw a performance another Fifth Symphony: Mahler’s! This orchestra does not lack stamina! Woods, by the way, is as fine a Mahler conductor as I have had the privilege to hear.) The winds shone in particular in the two scherzi, though had some telling solos elsewhere, such as that for the principal flute towards the close of the Lento. The brass were magisterial throughout the outer and central spans, but the bedrock on which Sawyers constructs his symphonic edifices was provided by the strings, who did not disappoint. I cannot wait for the UK premiere, and the chance to hear this terrific symphony, very possibly Sawyers’ finest, in the flesh.
