Stacey Rishoi (mezzo-soprano), Boulder Children’s Chorale, Women of Boulder Concert Chorale, Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra / Kenneth Woods

Gunning Symphony no.10 (2016-17) [First public performance]
Mahler Symphony no.3 in D minor (1893-6)

Colorado MahlerFest 195269164287 [two discs, 114’21”]
Live performances on 22 May 2022, Macky Auditorium, Boulder, Colorado

Reviewed by Richard Whitehouse

What’s the story?

The 35th Colorado MahlerFest, the eighth under the direction of Kenneth Woods, reached its culmination with the performance of Mahler’s Third Symphony and preceded in this concert with a first public hearing for the 10th Symphony by the late-lamented Christopher Gunning.

What’s the music like?

In its setting out the creation of the world, from an inanimate state to the dawn of humanity, Mahler’s Third Symphony is his most ambitious conceptually and certainly his lengthiest. It is to Woods’s credit that, though his account at 92 minutes is among the swiftest, there is no sense of haste – not least his handling of the first movement’s vastly extended sonata design, which amply conveys the burgeoning of natural forces with unbridled impetus but equally a fantasy or even playfulness manifest through the irresistible abandon of those closing pages.

Those having watched the online broadcast will recall Woods observing the customary break before the remaining five movements which constitute the second part. Here, though, there is barely a pause going into the second movement, its minuet-like lilt and evocation of all things vernal rarely having sounded so delicate or ingratiating. The ensuing scherzo is almost as fine, the often boisterous irony of its outer sections finding contrast in trios whose post-horn solos are ethereally rendered by Richard Adams, with a frisson of danger emerging in the final bars.

Nor is Stacey Rishoi found wanting in a Nietzsche setting that alternates earnest speculation with heartfelt yearning. She is no less inside its successor’s setting of a Knaben Wunderhorn text, its ambivalence offset by a whimsical response from the women’s and children’s choirs. Others may have found even more profundity from the finale, but Woods ensures it emerges as a seamless totality – the anguish at its centre drawn into a rapt eloquence which is carried through to a coda bringing this disciplined and persuasive performance to its ecstatic close.

Unlike other of his peers, their concert output little more than a rehash of their work for film and television, Christopher Gunning’s symphonies and concertos seem abstract music with a vengeance. The single-movement 10th Symphony is both cohesive in its structure and methodical in its evolution. Woods has recorded it with BBC National Orchestral of Wales (Signum Classics), and while that studio recording has greater formal focus, the Colorado musicians unfold this quixotic score to its serene ending with demonstrably greater spontaneity and impulsiveness.

Does it all work?

Almost always. Those who prefer a more expansive or interventionist approach in the Mahler may be disappointed, but the no-nonsense nature of Woods’s traversal conveys any amount of insight or expressive nuance. Presentation is equally straightforward, but Mahler’s expression markings for each movement should have been included alongside those descriptive headings he later deleted, while the Gunning might have been best placed at the start (as in the concert) with the first part of the Mahler – allowing its second part to unfold as an unbroken continuity.

Is it recommended?

Very much. Boulder’s Macky Auditorium might not have the most spacious perspective, but its clarity and definition audibly benefit a performance that is much more than the memento of an occasion. Indeed, this MahlerFest series is shaping up to be a memorable Mahler cycle.

Buy

For further purchase options, visit the MahlerFest website – and for more information on the festival itself, click here. Click on the names for further information on conductor Kenneth Woods and composer Christopher Gunning