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Programming guide: August

1892:  Ives sends Variations on "America" ink copy to publisher William E. Ashmall (who eventually rejects the idea of publishing the work).

1899:  Date on manuscript: song Omens and Oracles

1904:  Date on manuscript: Largo cantabile: Hymn [mvt. i of A Set of Three Short Pieces], sketch, "Morristown, N.J. Aug...1904"

1910:  Date on manuscript: Symphony No. 4, mvt. i, "started at Pell¹s [cabin at Elk Lake, NY] ... with Hawthorne"

1922:  First printing: 114 Songs, Redding, Conn., by the author

1926:  Date on manuscript: song Sunrise, apparently Ives¹s last wholly new composition

1928:  Premiere: piano "In the Inn" [mvt. ii^b of Sonata No. 1 for Piano] (Violet Duncan [pf]), St. Louis, Missouri

1954:  First recording: songs Abide with me, Autumn, Berceuse, Disclosure, In Flanders Fields, Maple Leaves, The See¹r, Serenity, Swimmers, Tarrant Moss, Tom Sails Away, Walking, Where the eagle cannot see, and White Gulls (Helen Boatwright [S] and John Kirkpatrick [pf]; issued in 1954 by Overtone Records)

1967:  First recording: piano The Celestial Railroad, Invention in D, March No. 6 for Piano, with "Here¹s to Good Old Yale", Set of Five Take-Offs, Varied Air and Variations [complete], Waltz-Rondo, and Studies No. 2, 5, 6, 7, 15, 20, and 23 (Alan Mandel; issued 1968 by Desto)

1990:  First recording: song A Scotch Lullaby (Yolanda Marcoulesou-Stern [S] and Katja Phillabaum [pf]; issued in 1991 by Gasparo)

Aug 3  1845: Birth of Ives¹s father George Edward Ives at Danbury, Conn. Biographers Henry and Sidney Cowell said that Charles Ives, in essence, wrote his father¹s music. Thus, all of Ives¹s music memorializes his father, but particularly so Decoration Day [mvt. ii of "Holidays Symphony"] and song Remembrance.
1921: Premiere: The Alcotts [mvt. iii of Sonata No. 2 for Piano: Concord, Mass.] (Clifton Furness [pf]), in a lecture-recital (location unknown)

Aug 4  1792: Birth of poet Percy Bysshe Shelley near Horsham, England. Ives used Shelley poems in songs Rough Wind and The World¹s Wanderers.
1901: Date on manuscript: Sonata No. 1 for Piano, mvt. i, sketch, page 1, "Pine Mt." (a vacation spot SW of Danbury, Conn.)
1910: Birth of arranger (and composer) William Schuman at New York City. Schuman arranged for orchestra Ives¹s Variations on "America" (a showpiece arrangement that is far better known than the original organ version).

Aug 5  1943: Birth of baritone William Parker at Butler, Penn. Parker sang for the first recording of seven Ives songs: The Camp Meeting, Chanson de Florian, His Exaltation, Qu¹il m¹irait bien, Rosamunde, Sunrise, and Watchman!

Aug 6  1950: First recording: Symphony No. 3 (National Gallery Orchestra, cond. by Richard Bales; for Station WCFM, released fall 1950)

Aug 8  1922: Birth of conductor (and composer) Lukas Foss. Foss conducted the first professional performances of chamber ens Set No. 1 and From the Steeples and the Mountains.

Aug 10  1950: Premiere: Tone Roads No. 1 (Barati Chamber Orchestra, cond. by George Barati), at San Francisco, Calif.

Aug 11  1920: Birth of pianist William Masselos at Niagara Falls, NY. Masselos premiered Sonata No. 1 for Piano (17 Feb 1949) and Three-Page Sonata (25 Apr 1949).

Aug 14  1904: Date on manuscript: Thanksgiving [mvt. iv of "Holidays Symphony"], "[score-sketch] finished...on Pine Mt." (a vacation spot SW of Danbury, Conn.)
1907: Date on manuscript: Spring Song adapted from an earlier song, at Elk Lake, NY

Aug 15  1896: Birth of Leon Theremin [Lev Termen], inventor of the space controlled electronic instrument that now bears his name, at St. Petersburg, Russia. Ives heard Theremin¹s demonstration concert at Carnegie Hall in 1930 and later incorporated the "Ether organ" (or "Aetherophone") in the final movements each of his Orchestral Sets No. 1 & 2 and Symphony No. 4.
1951: First publication: Sonata No. 3 for Violin and Piano, ed. by Sol Babitz and Ingolf Dahl, Bryn Mawr: Merion Music

Aug 16  1882: Danbury Evening News: "Georgie [recte Charlie], a little son of George E. Ives, and Mattie [recte Mollie], the youngest daughter of Librarian Sanford [recte of Noah David Parmelee], had a juvenine [sic] booth for the sale of refreshments, Saturday, the proceeds, as a placard informed the public, being for the fresh air fund..." Ironically, it was the Fresh Air Fund that, 33 years later to the day, brought to the Iveses the little girl, Edith Osborne, whom they would soon adopt as their only child. Ives wrote several songs inspired by Edith: Immortality, To Edith, Two Little Flowers, and Edith¹s own Christmas Carol.
1915: Diary: "the baby, Edith [Osborne], 15 months old, stayed on with us." [see entry immediately above]

Aug 17  1974: Premiere: March: The Circus Band [Kenneth Singleton¹s realization of chorus and chamber ens version], Skit for Danbury Fair, Take-Off Nos. 7 & 8 (Paul Winter Consort supplemented by members of the Yale Theater Orchestra, cond. by James Sinclair), on the grounds of the Ives house in West Redding, Conn.

Aug 19  1947: Birth of conductor, trumpeter, and Ives editor Gerard Schwarz at Hoboken, NJ. With the American Brass Quintet, Schwarz made the first recording of From the Steeples and the Mountains and Song for Harvest Season and premiered and recorded his edition of Chromâtimelôdtune.

Aug 20  1896: Susan B. Hill (author of the text) writes Ives about "our song" William Will, a Republican campaign song for the election of William McKinley.

Aug 21  1931: Birth of choral conductor Gregg Smith Smith at Chicago, Ill. As conductor, Smith performed the premiere and/or first recording of thirty Ives works (mostly choral); he is also the editor of seven Ives choral publications.

Aug 22  1862: Birth of Claude Debussy at St. Germain-en-Laye, France. Ives borrowed material from Debussy¹s Children¹s Corner ("Golliwog¹s Cake-Walk"; in "Hawthorne," mvt. ii of Sonata No. 2 for Piano: Concord, Mass.) and Prelude a l'après-midi d'un faune (in song Grantchester).

Aug 25  1918: Birth of conductor (and composer) Leonard Bernstein at Lawrence, Mass. In the 1960s, Bernstein led the New York Philharmonic in an influential re-examination (and recording) of Ives¹s orchestral works (particularly Symphonies No. 2 & 3 and the "Holidays Symphony") . He conducted the premiere of Symphony No.2 (in 1951) and first recording of Gong on the Hook and Ladder (in 1967).

Aug 28  1963: First recording: piano Study No. 21: Some Southpaw Pitching and Study No. 22 (James Sykes; issued in 1964 by Folkways)

Aug 29  1809: Birth of writer Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. at Cambridge, Mass. Ives used a Holmes poem as text for song The Last Reader.

Aug 30  1820: Birth of composer George F. Root at Sheffield, Mass. Root was one of the outstanding songwriters of the Civil War era. To evoke the war in which his father had served as a bandmaster, Ives borrowed material from the following Root songs: The Battle Cry of Freedom (Decoration Day, Fourth of July, Three Places in New England/i&ii, "Country Band" March, Sonata No. 2 for Violin and Piano/ii, Three Quarter-Tone Pieces/ii, and songs In Flanders Fields, They Are There!, and The Things Our Fathers Loved)
Just Before the Battle Mother (song They Are There! )
The Shining Shore (Symphony No. 1/i, Thanksgiving, String Quartet No. 1/ii-iv, Sonata No. 1 for Violin and Piano/i, Fugue in Four Keys on "The Shining Shore", and songs On Judges¹ Walk, Religion, and Rough Wind)
There¹s Music in the Air (Symphony No.3/ii)
Tramp, Tramp, Tramp (Symphony No. 4/ii, The Fourth of July, Calcium Light Night, Overture and March "1776", Sonata No. 1 for Violin and Piano/ii, The Celestial Railroad, and song They Are There!)