Charles Edward Ives (October 20, 1874 – May 19, 1954) was an American modernist
composerA composer is a person who creates music, usually by musical notation, for interpretation and performance. The level of distinction between composers and other musicians varies, which affects issues such as copyright and the deference given to individual interpretations of a particular piece of...
. He is widely regarded as one of the first American composers of international significance. Ives' music was largely ignored during his life, and many of his works went unperformed for many years. Over time, Ives came to be regarded as an "American Original"; Ives combined the American popular and church-music traditions of his youth with European art music, and was among the first composers to engage in a systematic program of
experimental musicExperimental music refers, in the English-language literature, to a compositional tradition which arose in the mid-twentieth century, particularly in North America, and whose most famous and influential exponent was John Cage...
, with
musical techniqueMusical technique is the study of natural, minor, major, and chromatic scales, minor and major triads, dominant and diminished sevenths, formula patterns and arpeggios. The purpose of this study is to not only practice musical theory, but to train the musician to play particularly difficult...
s including
polytonalityThe musical use of more than one key simultaneously is polytonality. Bitonality is the use of only two different keys at the same time.A well-known, controversial example is the fanfare at the beginning of the second tableau of Igor Stravinsky's ballet, Petrushka...
,
polyrhythmPolyrhythm is the simultaneous sounding of two or more independent rhythms. Polyrhythms can be distinguished from irrational rhythms, which can occur within the context of a single part; polyrhythms require at least two rhythms to be played concurrently, one of which is typically an irrational...
,
tone clusterA tone cluster is a musical chord comprising at least three consecutive tones in a scale. Prototypical tone clusters are based on the chromatic scale, and are separated by semitones. For instance, three adjacent piano keys struck simultaneously produce a tone cluster...
s,
aleatoricAleatoric music is music in which some element of the composition is left to chance, and/or some primary element of a composed work's realization is left to the determination of its performer...
elements, and
quarter toneA quarter tone is an interval about half as wide as a semitone, which is half a whole tone.Many composers are known for having written music including quarter tones or the quarter tone scale, first proposed by 19th-century music theorist Mikha'il Mishaqah , including: Pierre Boulez, Julián...
s, thus foreshadowing virtually every major musical innovation of the 20th century.
Sources of Charles Ives’s tonal imagery are
hymn tuneA hymn tune is a musical composition to which a hymn text is sung. Some tunes consist of only the melody, sung in unison or parallel octaves, with or without accompaniment...
s and traditional songs, the town band at holiday parade, the fiddlers at Saturday night dances, patriotic songs, sentimental parlor ballads, and the melodies of
Stephen FosterStephen Collins Foster , known as the "father of American music," was the pre-eminent songwriter in the United States of the 19th century...
.
Biography
Charles Ives was born in
DanburyDanbury is a city in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. It has an estimated population of 78,736. Danbury is the fourth largest city in Fairfield County and is the seventh largest city in Connecticut....
,
ConnecticutConnecticut is a state in the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and New York to the west and south ....
, the son of George Ives, a
U.S. ArmyThe United States Army is the branch of the United States Military responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military and is one of seven uniformed services...
bandleader in the
American Civil WarThe American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several other names, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America...
, and his wife Mary Parmelee. A strong influence of Charles's may have been sitting in the Danbury town square, listening to his father's marching band and other bands on other sides of the square
simultaneouslyIn music, a simultaneity is more than one complete musical texture occurring at the same time, rather than in succession. This first appeared in the music of Charles Ives, and is common in the music of Conlon Nancarrow and others....
. George Ives's unique music lessons were also a strong influence on Charles; George Ives took an open-minded approach to musical theory, encouraging his son to experiment in bitonal and polytonal harmonizations. It was from his father that Charles Ives also learned the music of
Stephen FosterStephen Collins Foster , known as the "father of American music," was the pre-eminent songwriter in the United States of the 19th century...
. Ives became a church organist at the age of 14 and wrote various hymns and songs for church services, including his
Variations on 'America' .
Ives moved to
New HavenNew Haven is the second-largest municipality in Connecticut, after Bridgeport and just ahead of Hartford, with a core population of about 124,000 people. "New Haven" may also refer to the wider Greater New Haven area, which has nearly 600,000 inhabitants in the immediate area...
in 1893, enrolling in the
Hopkins SchoolThe Hopkins School is a co-educational, private day school, located in New Haven, Connecticut.Founded in 1660, Hopkins School is the fifth-oldest educational institution in the United States and the second-oldest secondary school in continuous operation in North America, younger than the Roxbury...
where he captained the baseball team. In September 1894, Ives entered
Yale UniversityYale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut, and a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States. Yale has produced many notable alumni, including five...
, studying under
Horatio ParkerHoratio William Parker was an American composer and teacher. He was a central figure in musical life in New Haven, Connecticut in the late 19th century, and is best remembered as the teacher of Charles Ives....
. Here he composed in a choral style similar to his mentor, writing church music and even an 1896 campaign song for
William McKinleyWilliam McKinley Jr. was the 25th President of the United States, and the last veteran of the American Civil War to be elected to the office....
. On November 4, 1894 Charles's father died, a crushing blow to the young composer, but to a large degree Ives continued the musical experimentation he had begun with George Ives.
At Yale College Ives was a prominent figure; he was a member of HeBoule,
Delta Kappa EpsilonDelta Kappa Epsilon is a fraternity founded at Yale College in 1844 by 15 men of the sophomore class who, upon hearing that some but not all of them had been invited to join the two existing societies , instead elected to form their own fraternity...
(Phi chapter) and
Wolf's Head SocietyWolf's Head Society is an undergraduate senior or secret society at Yale University, New Haven, CT. W.H.S. is recomposed annually of sixteen junior year Yale College students. Undergraduate members spend their senior year as a delegation answerable to the graduate body, composed of past members,...
, and sat as chairman of the
Ivy CommitteeThe Ivy League is an athletic conference comprising eight private institutions of higher education in the Northeastern United States. The term is most commonly used to refer to those eight schools considered as a group...
. He enjoyed sports at Yale and played on the varsity football team. Michael C. Murphy, his coach, once remarked that it was a crying shame that Charles Ives spent so much time at music as otherwise he could have been a champion sprinter. His works
Calcium Light Night and
Yale-Princeton Football Game show the influence of college and sports on Ives' composition. He wrote his
Symphony No. 1 as his senior thesis under Parker's supervision.
He continued his work as a church organist until May 1902. In 1899 he moved to employment with the insurance agency Charles H. Raymond & Co., where he stayed until 1906. In 1907, upon the failure of Raymond & Co., he and his friend
Julian MyrickJulian Southall Myrick was an insurance salesman and promoter of tennis from the United States.Myrick was born in Murfreesboro, North Carolina on March 1, 1880. In 1898, Myrick entered the insurance business as an application clerk at the Mutual Insurance Company. In 1906, Myrick partnered with his...
formed their own insurance agency Ives & Co., which later became Ives & Myrick, where he remained until he retired. During his career as an insurance executive, Ives devised creative ways to structure life-insurance packages for people of means, which laid the foundation of the modern practice of
estate planningEstate planning is the process of anticipating and arranging for the disposal of an estate. Estate planning typically attempts to eliminate uncertainties over the administration of a probate and maximize the value of the estate by reducing taxes and other expenses...
. His
Life Insurance with Relation to Inheritance Tax, published in 1918, was well-received. As a result of this he achieved considerable fame in the insurance industry of his time, with many of his business peers surprised to learn that he was also a composer. In his spare time he composed music and, until his marriage, worked as an organist in Danbury and
New HavenNew Haven is the second-largest municipality in Connecticut, after Bridgeport and just ahead of Hartford, with a core population of about 124,000 people. "New Haven" may also refer to the wider Greater New Haven area, which has nearly 600,000 inhabitants in the immediate area...
as well as
BloomfieldBloomfield is a township in Essex County, New Jersey, United States. As of the United States 2000 Census, the township population was 47,683.-History:...
,
New JerseyNew Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is bordered on the north by New York, and to the east by the Hudson River, Upper New York Bay, the Kill Van Kull, Newark Bay, the Arthur Kill, Raritan Bay, Sandy Hook Bay, Westchester County, New York City, Long Island, and...
and New York City. In 1907, Ives suffered the first of several "heart attacks" (as he and his family called them) that he had through out his lifetime. These attacks may have been psychological in origin rather than physical. Following his recovery from the 1907 attack, Ives entered into one of the most creative periods of his life as a composer.
After marrying Harmony Twitchell in 1908, they moved into their own apartment in New York. He had a remarkably successful career in insurance, and continued to be a prolific composer until he suffered another of several heart attacks in 1918, after which he composed very little, writing his very last piece, the song
Sunrise, in August 1926. In 1922, Ives published his
114 Songs which represents the breadth of his work as a composer — it includes art songs, songs he wrote as a teenager and young man, and highly dissonant songs such as "The Majority."
According to his wife, one day in early 1927 he came downstairs with tears in his eyes: he could compose no more, he said, "nothing sounds right." There have been numerous theories advanced to explain the silence of his late years, which seems as mysterious as the last several decades of the life of
Jean SibeliusJean Sibelius was a Finnish composer of the later Romantic period whose music played an important role in the formation of the Finnish national identity....
, who also stopped composing at almost the same time. While Ives had stopped composing, and was increasingly plagued by health problems, he did continue to revise and refine his earlier work, as well as oversee premieres of his music. After continuing health problems, including diabetes, in 1930 he retired from his insurance business, which gave him more time to devote to his musical work, but he was unable to write any new music. During the 1940s he revised his
Concord Sonata, publishing it in 1947 (an earlier version of the sonata and the accompanying prose volume,
Essays Before a Sonata were privately printed in 1920).
Ives died in 1954 in New York City.
Ives's early music (before 1900)
Ives was formally trained in music at Yale. His First Symphony shows a grasp of the academic skills needed to write in the traditional
sonata formSonata form is a musical form that has been used widely since the early Classical period. While it is typically used in the first movement of multimovement pieces, it is sometimes employed in subsequent movements as well...
of the late 19th century, as well as a tendency to display an individual and iconoclastic harmonic style. His father was a band leader, and like
Hector Berlioz Hector Berlioz was a French Romantic composer, best known for his compositions Symphonie fantastique and Grande Messe des morts . Berlioz made significant contributions to the modern orchestra with his Treatise on Instrumentation...
, Ives was fascinated with both outdoor music and instrumentation. His attempts to fuse these interests coupled with his devotion to Beethoven set the direction for the remainder of his musical life.
Ives published a large collection of his songs, many of which had piano parts which paralleled modern movements in Europe, including bitonality and
pantonalityIn music pantonality may refer to:*Twelve tone music, seen as an extension of tonality to all keys *Nonfunctional tonality or pandiatonicismterm used by Schoenberg in the place of atonality, which he refused...
. He was an accomplished pianist, capable of improvising in a variety of styles, including those which were then quite new. Although he is now best known for his orchestral music, he composed two string quartets and other works of
chamber musicChamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers with one performer to a part...
. His work as an organist led him to write
Variations on "America" in 1891, which he premiered at a recital celebrating the
Fourth of JulyThe United States Declaration of Independence is a statement adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, which announced that the thirteen American colonies then at war with Great Britain were now independent states, and thus no longer a part of the British Empire...
. The piece takes the
tune"My Country, 'Tis of Thee", also known as "America", is an American patriotic song, whose lyrics were written by Samuel Francis Smith. The melody is that of the British national anthem, God Save the King or Queen, although Smith encountered it by way of a German adaptation...
(which is the same one as is used for the
national anthem of the United Kingdom"God Save the Queen", or "God Save the King", is an anthem used in a number of Commonwealth realms. It is the national anthem of the United Kingdom and her territories and dependencies, Norfolk Island, one of the two national anthems of the Cayman Islands and New Zealand and the royal anthem of...
) through a series of fairly standard but witty variations; it was not published until 1949. The variations differ sharply: a running line, a set of close harmonies, a march, a
polonaiseThe polonaise is a slow dance of Polish origin, in 3/4 time. Its name is French for "Polish." The notation alla polacca on a score indicates that the piece should be played with the rhythm and character of a polonaise The polonaise is a slow dance of Polish origin, in 3/4 time. Its...
, and a ragtime allegro; the interludes are one of the first uses of bitonality;
William SchumanWilliam Howard Schuman was an American composer and music administrator.-Life:Born in the Bronx in New York City to Samuel and Rachel Schuman, Schuman was named after the twenty-seventh U.S. president, William Howard Taft...
arranged this for orchestra in 1964 and again for symphonic band in 1968.
Middle period (1900-1910)
Around the turn of twentieth century Ives composed his
Symphony No. 2The Second Symphony was written by Charles Ives between 1897 and 1901. It consists of five movements and lasts approximately 40 minutes.The piece is scored for piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 clarinets, 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, snare drum, bass drum...
, signifying a departure from the conservative approach of his composition teacher at Yale, Horatio Parker. His first symphony is a more conventional piece since Parker had insisted that he stick to the older European style. However, the second symphony, composed after he had graduated, adopted new techniques that included musical quotes, unusual phrasing and orchestration, and even a blatantly dissonant 11 note chord ending the work. The second symphony foreshadows his later compositional style even though the piece is relatively conservative by Ives' standards.
In 1906 Ives composed what some have argued was the first radical musical work of the twentieth century, "Central Park in the Dark". The piece evokes an evening comparing sounds from nearby nightclubs in Manhattan (playing the popular music of the day, ragtime, quoting "Hello My Baby" and even Sousa's "
Washington Post March"The Washington Post" is a patriotic march composed by John Philip Sousa in 1889. Since then, it has remained as one of his most popular marches throughout the United States and many countries abroad.-History:...
") with the mysterious dark and misty qualities of the Central Park woods (played by the strings). The string harmony uses shifting chord structures that are not solely based on thirds but a combination of thirds, fourths, and fifths. Near the end of the piece the remainder of the orchestra builds up to a grand chaos ending on a dissonant chord, leaving the string section to end the piece save for a brief violin duo superimposed over the unusual chord structures.
Ives had composed two symphonies, but it is with
The Unanswered QuestionThe Unanswered Question is a work by American composer Charles Ives. It was originally the first of "Two Contemplations" composed in 1906, paired with another piece called Central Park in the Dark. As with many of Ives' works, it was largely unknown until much later in his life, being first...
(1906), written for the highly unusual combination of
trumpetThe trumpet is a musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BC...
, four
fluteThe flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind group. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...
s, and
string orchestraA string orchestra is understood as an orchestra composed solely of certain instruments of the string family. These instruments are the violin, the viola, the violoncello, the double bass , the piano, the harp, and sometimes percussion...
, that he established the mature sonic world that became his signature style. The strings (located offstage) play very slow,
choraleA chorale was originally a hymn sung by a christian congregation. In casual modern usage, this term also includes classical settings of such hymns and works of a similar character....
-like music throughout the piece while on several occasions the trumpet (positioned behind the audience) plays a short motif that Ives described as "the eternal question of existence". Each time the trumpet is answered with increasingly shrill outbursts from the flutes (onstage) — apart from the last:
The Unanswered QuestionThe Unanswered Question is a work by American composer Charles Ives. It was originally the first of "Two Contemplations" composed in 1906, paired with another piece called Central Park in the Dark. As with many of Ives' works, it was largely unknown until much later in his life, being first...
. The piece is typical Ives — it juxtaposes various disparate elements, it appears to be driven by a narrative never fully revealed to the audience, and it is tremendously mysterious. It has become one of his more popular works.
Leonard BernsteinLeonard Bernstein was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
borrowed its title for his
Charles Eliot Norton LecturesThe Charles Eliot Norton Professorship of Poetry at Harvard University was established in 1925 as an annual lectureship in "poetry in the broadest sense" and named for the university's former professor of fine arts. Distinguished creative figures and scholars in the arts, including painting,...
in 1973, noting that he always thought of the piece as a musical question, not a metaphysical one.
Mature period (1910–1923)
Starting around 1910 Ives began composing his most accomplished works including the "Holidays Symphony" and arguably his best-known piece "
Three Places in New EnglandThe Three Places in New England is a composition for orchestra by Charles Ives. It was composed across a long span of time , however the bulk was written between 1911 and 1914. The piece is famous for its use of musical quotation and paraphrasing, as explained later in this article...
".
Pieces such as
The Unanswered QuestionThe Unanswered Question is a work by American composer Charles Ives. It was originally the first of "Two Contemplations" composed in 1906, paired with another piece called Central Park in the Dark. As with many of Ives' works, it was largely unknown until much later in his life, being first...
were almost certainly influenced by the New England
transcendentalistTranscendentalism was a group of new ideas in literature, religion, culture, and philosophy that emerged in New England in the early to middle 19th century...
writers
Ralph Waldo EmersonRalph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, philosopher, and poet, best remembered for leading the Transcendentalist movement of the early 19th century. His teachings directly influenced the growing New Thought movement of the mid 1800s...
and
Henry David ThoreauHenry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, philosopher, and leading transcendentalist...
. These were important influences to Ives, as he acknowledged in his
Piano Sonata No. 2: Concord, Mass., 1840–60The Piano Sonata No. 2, Concord, Mass., 1840-60 by Charles Ives, commonly known as the Concord Sonata, is one of the composer's best-known and most highly regarded pieces....
(1909–15), which he described as an "impression of the spirit of transcendentalism that is associated in the minds of many with Concord, Mass., of over a half century ago...undertaken in impressionistic pictures of Emerson and Thoreau, a sketch of the
AlcottsLouisa May Alcott was an American novelist. She is best known for the novel Little Women, written and set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House in Concord, Massachusetts and published in 1868...
, and a
scherzoA scherzo is a piece of music or a movement, in a certain style, that forms part of a larger piece such as a symphony, and the scherzo is often the third movement of a symphony, sonata, or string quartet. The word "scherzo" means "joke" in Italian...
supposed to reflect a lighter quality which is often found in the fantastic side of
HawthorneNathaniel Hawthorne was an American novelist and short story writer.Nathaniel Hathorne was born in 1804 in the city of Salem, Massachusetts to Nathaniel Hathorne and Elizabeth Clarke Manning Hathorne...
."
The sonata is possibly Ives's best-known piece for solo piano (although it should be noted that there is an optional part for flute). (A part for
violaThe viola is a bowed string instrument. It is the middle voice of the violin family, between the violin and the cello.The casual observer may mistake the viola for the violin because of their similarity in size, closeness in pitch range , and nearly identical playing position...
in the "Emerson" movement is not intended for a viola player — it is simply the "viola part" from the original
Emerson ConcertoThe "Emerson" Piano Concerto was the first draft of Charles Ives's "Emerson" movement of the Second Piano Sonata The "Emerson" Piano Concerto (also entitled the "Emerson" Overture for Piano and Orchestra) was the first draft of Charles Ives's "Emerson" movement of the Second Piano Sonata The...
sketch, which was also to be played by bassoon and tubular bells.) Rhythmically and harmonically, it is typically adventurous, and it demonstrates Ives' fondness for
quotationMusical quotation is the practice of directly quoting another work in a new composition. The quotation may be from the same composer's work , or from a different composer's work...
— on several occasions the opening motto from
BeethovenLudwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. He was a crucial figure in the transitional period between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western classical music, and remains one of the most acclaimed and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, of the Electorate of Cologne and...
's
Fifth SymphonySymphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67, was written by Ludwig van Beethoven in 1804–08. This symphony is one of the most popular and well-known compositions in all of European classical music, and one of the most often played symphonies. It comprises four movements: an opening sonata allegro, an...
is quoted. It also contains one of the most striking examples of Ives' experimentalism: in the second movement, he instructs the pianist to use a piece of wood to produce a dense but generally very soft cluster chord. All these effects are combined to create one of the towering masterworks of 20th century piano literature—an unprecedented masterpiece of American music.
Perhaps the most remarkable piece of orchestral music Ives completed was his
Fourth SymphonyThe Symphony No. 4, S. 4 by Charles Ives was written between the years of 1910 and 1916. The symphony is notable for its multi-layered complexity - usually necessitating two conductors in performance - and for its over-sized orchestra...
(1910–16). The list of forces required to perform the work alone is extraordinary. The work closely mirrors
The Unanswered Question. There is no shortage of novel effects. (A
tremolandoTremolo, or tremolando, is a musical term describing various trembling effects, falling roughly into two types. The first is a rapid reiteration...
is heard throughout the second movement. A fight between discordance and traditional tonal music is heard in the final movement. The piece ends quietly with just the percussion playing at a distance.) In it Ives finally resolves all of his compositional issues and the full force of his considerable genius is heard. The final movement can be seen as an apotheosis of his work and a culmination of his musical achievement. A complete performance was not given until 1965, almost half a century after the symphony was completed, and more than a decade after Ives's death.
Ives left behind material for an unfinished
Universe SymphonyThe Universe Symphony is an unfinished work by American classical music composer Charles Ives.The date of composition is unknown, but he probably worked on it periodically between 1911 and 1928...
, which he was unable to assemble in his lifetime despite two decades of work. This was due to his health problems as well as his shifting conception of the work. There have been several attempts at completion or performing version. However, none has found its way into general performance. The symphony takes the ideas in the Symphony No. 4 to an even higher level, with complex cross rhythms and difficult layered dissonance along with unusual instrumental combinations.
Ives's chamber works include the String Quartet No. 2, where the parts are often written at extremes of counterpoint, ranging from spiky dissonance in the movement labeled "Arguments" to transcendentally slow. This range of extremes is frequent in Ives' music — crushing blare and dissonance contrasted with lyrical quiet — and carried out by the relationship of the parts slipping in and out of phase with each other. Ives's idiom, like
Mahler'sGustav Mahler was a Bohemian-born Austrian composer and conductor. He was best known during his own lifetime as one of the leading orchestral and operatic conductors of the day...
, employed highly independent melodic lines. It is regarded as difficult to play because many of the typical signposts for performers are not present. This work had a clear influence on
Elliott CarterElliott Cook Carter, Jr. is a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer born and living in New York City. He studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris in the 1930s, and then returned to the United States. After a neoclassical phase, he went on to write atonal, rhythmically complex music...
's Second String Quartet, which is similarly a four-way theatrical conversation.
Reception
Ives's music was largely ignored during his lifetime as an active composer, but since then his reputation has greatly increased.
JuilliardThe Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City, United States, is a performing arts conservatory...
commemorated the 50th anniversary of Ives' death by performing his music over six days in 2004. Many of his works went unperformed for many years. His tendency to experiment and his increasing use of dissonance were not well taken by the musical establishment of the time. The difficulties in performing the rhythmic complexities in his major orchestral works made them daunting challenges even decades after they were composed.
One of the more damning words one could use to describe music in Ives's view was "nice", and his famous remark "use your ears like men!" seemed to indicate that he did not care about his reception. On the contrary, Ives was interested in popular reception, but on his own terms.
Early supporters of his music included
Henry CowellHenry Cowell was an American composer, music theorist, pianist, teacher, publisher, and impresario. His contribution to the world of music was summed up by Virgil Thomson, writing in the early 1950s:...
,
Elliott CarterElliott Cook Carter, Jr. is a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer born and living in New York City. He studied with Nadia Boulanger in Paris in the 1930s, and then returned to the United States. After a neoclassical phase, he went on to write atonal, rhythmically complex music...
and
Aaron CoplandAaron Copland was an American composer of concert and film music, as well as an accomplished pianist. Instrumental in forging a distinctly American style of composition, he was widely known as "the dean of American composers". Copland's music achieved a balance between modern music and American...
. Cowell's periodical
New Music published a substantial number of Ives's scores (with the composer's approval), but for almost 40 years Ives had few performances that he did not arrange or back, generally with
Nicolas SlonimskyNicolas Slonimsky was a Russian born American composer, conductor, musician, music critic, lexicographer and author. He described himself as a "diaskeuast"; a reviser or interpolator.- Life :...
as the conductor. After seeing a copy of Ives' self-published 114 Songs during the 1930s, Copland published a newspaper article praising the collection.
Ives began to acquire more public recognition during the 1930s, with performances of a chamber orchestra version of his
Three Places in New England both in the U.S. and on tour in Europe by conductor Nicholas Slonimsky and the New York Town Hall premiere of his Piano Sonata No. 2 (the
Concord Sonata) by John Kirkpatrick in 1939, which led to favorable commentary in the major New York newspapers. Later, around the time of the composer's death in 1954, Kirkpatrick teamed with soprano Helen Boatwright for the first extended recorded recital of Ives' songs for the obscure Overtone label (Overtone Records catalog number 7). (Boatwright and Kirkpatrick recorded a new selection of songs for the Ives Centennial Collection that Columbia Records published in 1974.)
His obscurity lifted a little in the 1940s, when he met
Lou HarrisonLou Silver Harrison was an American composer. He was a student of Henry Cowell, Arnold Schoenberg, and K. P. H. Notoprojo Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917 – February 2, 2003) was an American composer. He was a student of Henry Cowell, Arnold Schoenberg, and K. P. H. Notoprojo Lou Silver...
, a fan of his music who began to edit and promote it. Most notably Harrison conducted the premiere of the
Symphony No. 3 (1904) in 1946. The next year, this piece won Ives the
Pulitzer Prize for MusicThe Pulitzer Prize for Music was first awarded in 1943. Joseph Pulitzer did not call for such a prize in his will, but had arranged for a music scholarship to be awarded each year...
. Ives gave the prize money away (half of it to Harrison), saying "prizes are for boys, and I'm all grown up".
At this time, Ives was also promoted by
Bernard HerrmannBernard Herrmann was an American composer noted for his work in motion pictures.An Academy Award-winner , Herrmann is particularly known for his collaborations with director Alfred Hitchcock, most famously Psycho, North by Northwest, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo...
, who worked as a conductor at CBS and in 1940 became principal conductor of the CBS Symphony Orchestra. While there he was a champion of Charles Ives's music. When meeting Ives, Hermann confessed that he had tried his hand at performing the Concord Sonata.
Remarkably, Ives, who actually avoided the radio and the phonograph, agreed to make a series of piano recordings from 1933 to 1943 that were later issued by
Columbia RecordsColumbia Records is an American record label founded in 1888.Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in pre-recorded sound, being the first record company to produce pre-recorded records as opposed to blank cylinders. Columbia Records went on to release records by an array of notable singers,...
on a special LP set issued for Ives's centenary in 1974.
New World RecordsNew World Records is a non-profit record label that documents important American music largely ignored by the commercial recording companies. It is part of Anthology of Recorded Music, Inc. ....
issued 42 tracks of Ives's recordings on CD on April 1, 2006.
Recognition of Ives's music has improved. He received praise from
Arnold SchoenbergArnold Schoenberg was an Austrian and later American composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...
, who regarded him as a monument to artistic integrity, and from the New York School of
William SchumanWilliam Howard Schuman was an American composer and music administrator.-Life:Born in the Bronx in New York City to Samuel and Rachel Schuman, Schuman was named after the twenty-seventh U.S. president, William Howard Taft...
. He won the admiration of
Gustav MahlerGustav Mahler was a Bohemian-born Austrian composer and conductor. He was best known during his own lifetime as one of the leading orchestral and operatic conductors of the day...
, who said that Ives was a true musical revolutionary. Mahler talked of premiering Ives's Third Symphony with the
New York PhilharmonicThe New York Philharmonic is a symphony orchestra based in New York City in the United States. It is one of the American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five"...
, but Mahler's death soon after prevented the premiere.
In 1951,
Leonard BernsteinLeonard Bernstein was an American conductor, composer, author, music lecturer and pianist. He was among the first conductors born and educated in the United States of America to receive worldwide acclaim...
conducted the world premiere of Ives's Second Symphony in a broadcast concert by the
New York PhilharmonicThe New York Philharmonic is a symphony orchestra based in New York City in the United States. It is one of the American orchestras commonly referred to as the "Big Five"...
; the Iveses heard the performance on their cook's radio and were amazed at the audience's warm reception to the music. Bernstein continued to conduct Ives's music and made a number of recordings with the Philharmonic for
Columbia RecordsColumbia Records is an American record label founded in 1888.Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in pre-recorded sound, being the first record company to produce pre-recorded records as opposed to blank cylinders. Columbia Records went on to release records by an array of notable singers,...
; he even honored Ives on one of his televised youth concerts and in a special disc included with the reissue of the 1960 recording of the second symphony and the
Fourth of July movement from Ives'
Holidays symphony.
Another pioneering Ives recording, undertaken during the 1950s, was the first complete set of the four violin sonatas, performed by Cleveland Orchestra concertmaster Rafael Druian and John Simms.
Leopold StokowskiLeopold Stokowski was a famous orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.In America, Stokowski performed with the Cincinnati Symphony...
took on the Symphony No. 4 in 1965, regarding the work as "the heart of the Ives problem"; the Carnegie Hall world premiere by the
American Symphony OrchestraThe American Symphony Orchestra is a New York-based American orchestra founded in 1962 by Leopold Stokowski, then aged 80. Following Maestro Stokowski's departure, Kazuyoshi Akiyama was appointed Music Director of the American Symphony Orchestra from 1973-1978. Music Directors during the early...
led to the first recording of the music.
Another promotor of Ives was choral conductor Gregg Smith, who made a series of recordings of the composer's shorter works during the 1960s, including first stereo recordings of the psalm settings and arrangements of many short pieces for theater orchestra. The Juilliard String Quartet recorded the two string quartets during the 1960s.
In the present,
Michael Tilson ThomasMichael Tilson Thomas , is an American conductor, pianist and composer. He is currently music director of the San Francisco Symphony.-Early years:...
is an enthusiastic exponent of Ives' symphonies, as is composer and biographer
Jan SwaffordJan Swafford is an American composer and author who teaches composition, theory, and musicology at the Boston Conservatory and writing at Tufts University. He earned his B.A. from Harvard College and his M.M.A. and D.M.A. from the Yale School of Music...
. Ives's work is regularly programmed in Europe. Ives has also inspired pictorial artists, most notably
Eduardo PaolozziSir Eduardo Luigi Paolozzi, KBE, FRA , was a Scottish sculptor and artist. He was a major figure in the international art world working without compromise on his own interpretation and vision of the world around us. Paolozzi investigated how we can fit into the modern world to resemble our...
, who entitled one of his 1970s sets of prints
Calcium Light Night, each print being named for an Ives piece (including
Central Park in the Dark). In 1991,
ConnecticutConnecticut is a state in the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and New York to the west and south ....
's legislature designated Ives as that state's official composer.
The
ScottishThe Scots people and an ethnic group indigenous to Scotland.An ethnic group, historically they emerged from an amalgamation of Picts, Gaels and Brythons....
baritoneBaritone is a type of classical male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek βαρύτονος, meaning 'deep sounding', music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second G below middle C to the F above...
Henry HerfordHenry Herford is a Scottish baritone singer.He read Classics and English at Cambridge University, and studied singing at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester where he was awarded the Curtis Gold Medal...
began a survey of Ives's songs in 1990, but this remains incomplete, owing to the collapse of the record company involved (
Unicorn-KanchanaUnicorn-Kanchana is an independent record label.Originally known as Unicorn Records, it specialised mainly in classical music and film soundtracks...
).
Pianist-composer and
Wesleyan UniversityWesleyan University is a private liberal arts college founded in 1831 and located in Middletown, Connecticut. Founded under the auspices of the Methodist Episcopal Church and with the support of prominent residents of Middletown, the now secular university was the first institution of higher...
professor Neely Bruce has made a life's study of Ives. To date, he has staged seven parts of a concert series devoted to the complete songs of Ives.
Musicologist David Gray Porter [AKA D. G. Porter] reconstructed a piano concerto, the "
Emerson ConcertoThe "Emerson" Piano Concerto was the first draft of Charles Ives's "Emerson" movement of the Second Piano Sonata The "Emerson" Piano Concerto (also entitled the "Emerson" Overture for Piano and Orchestra) was the first draft of Charles Ives's "Emerson" movement of the Second Piano Sonata The...
", from Ives's sketches. A recording of the work was released by Naxos Records.
However, Ives is not without his critics. Some find his music bombastic and pompous. Others find it, strangely enough, timid in that the fundamental sound of European traditional music is still present in his works. His onetime supporter Elliott Carter has called his work incomplete, but has since revised his stance.
Influence on twentieth-century music
A bold testament to Ives's greatness comes from no less an authority than
Arnold SchoenbergArnold Schoenberg was an Austrian and later American composer, associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art, and leader of the Second Viennese School...
himself. Arnold's widow eventually found a note of his in the form of a brief poem shortly after his death (just three years before Ives himself died). The note was originally written in 1944 when Schoenberg was living in Los Angeles and teaching at UCLA stating....
There is a great man living in this country – a composer. He has solved the problem how to preserve one's self and to learn. He responds to negligence by contempt. He is not forced to accept praise or blame. His name is Ives.
Ives was also a great financial supporter of twentieth century music, often supporting works that were written by other composers. This he did in secret, telling his beneficiaries it was really his wife who wanted him to do so.
Nicolas SlonimskyNicolas Slonimsky was a Russian born American composer, conductor, musician, music critic, lexicographer and author. He described himself as a "diaskeuast"; a reviser or interpolator.- Life :...
said in 1971, "He financed my entire career."
List of selected works
Note: Because Ives often made several different versions of the same piece, and because his work was generally ignored during his lifetime, it is often difficult to put exact dates on his compositions. The dates given here are sometimes best guesses. There have even been speculations that Ives purposely misdated his own pieces earlier or later than actually written, but these have been largely debunked by Ives scholars such as Jan Swafford.
- Variations on America for organ (1891)
- The Circus Band (a march describing the Circus coming to town)
- Psalm settings (14, 42, 54, 67, 90, 135, 150) (1890s)
- String Quartet No. 1
String Quartet No. 1 is one of the most studied works by composer Charles Ives. The piece is composed for the standard string quartet of two violins, a viola, and a cello. There are four movements:*I. Andante con moto*II. Allegro*III. Adagio cantabile...
, From the Salvation Army (1897–1900)
- Symphony No. 1 in D minor (1898–1901)
- Symphony No. 2
The Second Symphony was written by Charles Ives between 1897 and 1901. It consists of five movements and lasts approximately 40 minutes.The piece is scored for piccolo, 2 flutes, 2 clarinets, 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, snare drum, bass drum...
(Ives gave dates of 1899-1902; analysis of handwriting and manuscript paper suggests 1907-1909)
- Symphony No. 3
The Symphony No. 3, S. 3 , The Camp Meeting by Charles Ives was written between the years of 1908 and 1910. In 1947, Ives was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music for his Symphony No. 3. Later, his works were performed by conductors like Leonard Bernstein...
, The Camp Meeting (1908–10)
- Central Park in the Dark for chamber orchestra (1906, 1909)
- The Unanswered Question
The Unanswered Question is a work by American composer Charles Ives. It was originally the first of "Two Contemplations" composed in 1906, paired with another piece called Central Park in the Dark. As with many of Ives' works, it was largely unknown until much later in his life, being first...
for chamber group (1906; rev. 1934)
- Piano Sonata No. 1 (1909–16)
- Piano Trio
The Trio for Violin, Cello, and Piano is a work by the American composer Charles Ives. According to Charles Ives’ wife, the three movements of the piano trio are a reflection of Ives’ college days at Yale. He started writing the piece in 1904,...
(c1909–10, rev. c1914–15)
- Violin Sonata No. 1 (1910–14; rev. ca. 1924)
- Violin Sonata No. 4, Children's Day at the Camp Meeting (1911–16)
- A Symphony: New England Holidays
A Symphony: New England Holidays, also known as A New England Holiday Symphony or simply a Holiday Symphony, is a composition for orchestra written by Charles Ives. It took Ives from 1897 to 1913 to complete all four movements. The four movements in order are:*I. Washington’s Birthday*II....
(1904–1913)
- "Robert Browning" Overture (1911–14)
- Symphony No. 4
The Symphony No. 4, S. 4 by Charles Ives was written between the years of 1910 and 1916. The symphony is notable for its multi-layered complexity - usually necessitating two conductors in performance - and for its over-sized orchestra...
(1912–18; rev. 1924–26)
- String Quartet No. 2 (1913–15)
- Pieces for chamber ensemble grouped as "Sets," some called Cartoons or Take-Offs or Songs Without Voices (1906–18); includes Calcium Light Night
Calcium Light Night is a piece of music by American composer Charles Ives. It is one of his Cartoons or Take-Offs and is scored for piccolo, clarinet, cornet, trombone, bass drum, and two pianos...
- Three Places in New England
The Three Places in New England is a composition for orchestra by Charles Ives. It was composed across a long span of time , however the bulk was written between 1911 and 1914. The piece is famous for its use of musical quotation and paraphrasing, as explained later in this article...
(Orchestral Set No. 1) (1910–14; rev. 1929)
- Violin Sonata No. 2 (1914–17)
- Violin Sonata No. 3 (1914–17)
- Orchestral Set No. 2 (1915–19)
- Piano Sonata No. 2
The Piano Sonata No. 2, Concord, Mass., 1840-60 by Charles Ives, commonly known as the Concord Sonata, is one of the composer's best-known and most highly regarded pieces....
, Concord, Mass., 1840–60 (1916–19) (revised many times by Ives)
- Universe symphony (incomplete, 1915–28, worked on symphony until his death in 1954)
- 114 Songs (composed various years 1887–1921, published 1922.)
- Three Quarter Tone Piano Pieces (1923–24)
- Orchestral Set No. 3 (incomplete, 1919–26, notes added after 1934)
External links