Swiss Saxophone Orchestra premieres Trachsel's Symphony.

A saxophone orchestra gives a concert in a Zurich church featuring a world premiere and twentieth-century American music. The Swiss Saxophone Orchestra, now in its eighteenth year, performs under the American guest conductor Paul Cohen, who will premiere the Sixth Symphony by Swiss composer Thomas Trachsel. Trachsel led the orchestra for more than ten years and stepped down from the podium in 2025; his half-hour, large-scale symphony in four movements, together with piano and percussion, covers the orchestra's entire range, from heavenly soprano to cellar-deep subcontrabass. A unique aspect is the solemn, slow movement in the form of an Agnus Dei, which departs from the otherwise traditional symphonic movements (Prelude, Scherzo and Finale); Cohen, a saxophone professor at the Manhattan School of Music, also brings works from his own repertoire and places a second focus on twentieth-century American composers such as Robert Russell Bennett, Percy Grainger and William Schuman.