An Ives Newsletter - 19 May 2004

Ives in Danbury
On Wednesday afternoon, 19 May 2004, Danbury commemorated Ives at his Wooster Cemetery grave site, 50 years to the day after his death in 1954. Organized by Nancy Sudik, Executive Director of the Charles Ives Center for the Performing Arts (in Danbury), Danbury’s Mayor Mark Boughton welcomed the gathering of about 30 (including visitors from Berlin, Budapest, and a number of US states). Ives scholar James Sinclair remarked on Ives’s significance and read John Kirkpatrick’s letter to Carl and Charlotte Ruggles in which Kirkpatrick describes in detail Ives’s private funeral service (21 May 1954). Sudik read a passage from Memos and a trio of musicians anchored by Larry Deming on harmonium performed instrumentally the songs “Remembrance,” “Slow March,” and “At the River.” The gathered group sang the hymn “Abide With Me” which was the sole hymn sung at Ives’s funeral fifty years ago.

Concord Classic
The Library of Congress recently announced their second annual selection of 50 sound recordings that have been added to the National Recording Registry. John Kirkpatrick's landmark 1945 Concord recording (issued in 1948) is No. 27. The annotation (which may be seen in context at www.loc.gov/nrpb) reads: “John Kirkpatrick, eminent pianist and energetic promoter of American music, premiered Ives’ "Concord" Sonata in 1939. His performance of the technically-demanding work earned enthusiastic reviews for both Ives and Kirkpatrick and led to Kirkpatrick’s recording of the work. Now considered one of the most original of American composers, Ives’ works changed the direction of American music.

Ives in Berlin
In the Los Angeles Times (Sunday, 4 Apr 04), Mark Swed writes, "Had [Charles Ives] been a Berliner, all of Germany--and probably the entire musical world--would regard this year, the 50th anniversary of his death, as a major occasion. Ives represents the soul of American music...Yet the anniversary is receiving surprisingly scant attention in the US, while to be in Berlin recently was to be in Ivesland." Swed reports on a recent "weeklong series of concerts and a two-day symposium" in Berlin, collectively titled Ives & Consequences. "Perhaps the biggest difference between the German and American approaches to Ives involves his relationship to the mainstream," writes Swed, noting celebratory events this spring at the New York Philharmonic and the Juilliard School. The Berlin event "adamantly avoided the American mainstream...all of the American composers asked to speak at the symposium and featured in the concerts came from what the mainstream considers the fringe avant-garde." Swed praises the scholarly aspects of the festival, but opines that in German-dominated performances of Ives's music ranging from "incompetent" to "sincere but transcendental-less," the composer "didn't fare particularly well."

Ives in “Symphony”
In the forthcoming May/June issue of SYMPHONY, Kyle Gann considers the symphonies of Charles Ives.

Ives in Houston
Da Camera of Houston honored Charles Ives in the 50th anniversary of his death by bringing his String Quartet No.1 to audiences both in and out of the concert hall. As part of the Mirs Quartet’s residency at Da Camera, they participated in an open lecture/discussion at the Menil Collection on Ives’s compositional innovations, especially his uses of existing music. Led by Rice University professor Anthony K. Brandt, the discussion also included Da Camera Artistic Director Sarah Rothenberg, and Menil Collection Chief Curator, Matthew Drutt. The Mirs also performed at the Salvation Army’s Adult Rehabilitation Center Family Day service, where they discussed the Ives and performed several of its source hymns before playing the first movement in its entirety. The Ives was a central part of the Mirs’s subscription concert on March 2, 2004. The following night, they again performed movements of the Ives at a free concert at the Chinese Community
Center.

Correction!
We must offer a correction to the information regarding the only web site for buying the Ives VHS video "A Good Dissonance Like a Man." The address is www.facets.org.