Seventh Symphony is ‘Mahler at the top of the mountain’

By Peter Alexander

Mahler, it is well known, loved to hike in the alps. So it is fitting that Kenneth Woods, the brand new artistic director of the Colorado MahlerFest, compares Mahler’s Seventh Symphony to the summit of a fourteener.

Kenneth Woods. Photo by Benjamin Ealovega.

Woods succeeds Robert Olson, who retired last year after 28 years as founding director of the festival. The Seventh will be the major work performed at this year’s MahlerFest XXIX, with performances by Woods and the MahlerFest Orchestra at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 3:30 p.m. Sunday in Macky Auditorium.

Also on the orchestral program will be the U.S. premiere of Nachtmusiken by Austrian composer Kurt Schwertsik, which was commissioned for a Mahler festival in Manchester, England. Other events this weekend include a symposium by leading Mahler scholars, from 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Saturday in Room C199 of the CU Imig Music Building.

Read more in Boulder Weekly.

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Colorado MahlerFest XXIX
Kenneth Woods, artistic director and conductor

Mahler: Symphony No. 7
Kurt Schwertsik: Nachtmusiken, op. 104 (U.S. premiere)
7:30 p.m. Saturday, May 21
3:30 p.m. Sunday, May 22
Macky Auditorium
(Pre-concert lecture one hour before each concert)

Mahler hiking in the Austrian alps.

Other events:

7 p.m. Thursday, May 19
Free open rehearsal, Macky Auditorium

2 p.m. Friday, May 20
Film: 7, Boedecker Theater, Dairy Arts Center

7 p.m., Friday, May 20
Free open rehearsal, Macky Auditorium

9 a.m.–3:30 p.m. Saturday, May 21
Free Symposium, Room C199, Imig Music Building

Information and tickets