Andrew Norman burst upon the scene a few years ago with the three-movement, 45-minute-long symphony Play (2013, rev 2016), which earned the now 40-year-old composer the coveted Grawemeyer Award in 2017. I’ve only heard Play on the Boston Modern Orchestra Project’s superb recording under Gil Rose (see the Gramophone feature, 11/16), and Norman says the work is designed to be experienced live. I’ll buy that. On disc, at least, I find the work dazzling in its orchestral legerdemain, structural command and sheer ingenuity, but also exhausting. Sustain (2018) is something else entirely, however, and in all honesty I can’t listen to it without feeling a welling up of profound emotion.

Composed for the centenary of the LA Philharmonic, Norman says that Sustain deals with both time (specifically how our interaction with music might change in the next 100 years) and the natural world. ‘And if there is a sense of sadness or loss that permeates this music, it comes from the knowledge that we, at this critical moment in our history, are not doing enough to sustain the planet that sustains us.’

The work is cast in the form of a ‘contracting spiral’ in which the initial 17 minutes of music is repeated 10 times at increasingly faster tempos so that the final iteration is mere seconds long. It begins with a brief, billowing gesture from two pianos tuned a quarter-tone apart (this becomes a signal for the beginning of each subsequent repetition), then the strings begin a slow, vaporous descent. There are hints of aching melody (listen at 6'30") and some wondrous orchestral effects – in some, Norman seems to glance back to Ligeti’s Atmosphères while in others he stakes out entirely new territory (note, for instance, how he makes the orchestra sound almost electronic starting around 10'30").

As Sustain swirls inexorably towards its ultimate destruction, it exerts a gravitational pull that has the dramatic certitude of a Greek tragedy. I don’t want to spoil the ending for you; even if it doesn’t dispel the intense feeling of loss, it’s magical nonetheless. The performance is utterly gorgeous as well as gripping, and stunningly captures the clear acoustic of Disney Hall. Fervently recommended.