Today is the birthday of Charles Ives, an American original. Ives wrote the kind of music he wanted to write, stitching hymns and fiddle tunes of his youth into a brilliant crazy quilt of the American experience.
His father had been something of an original himself, a bandmaster during the Civil War. He taught Ives to sing in one key as he played in another. This instilled in his son, perhaps, the receptivity to recognize, when standing on a street corner during a parade, the natural dissonances and rhythmic complexities that resulted from the clash of sounds as marching bands wrapped around the block.
He was very successful at his day job in the insurance business (some of his work in the financial field laid the groundwork for modern practices in estate planning). While this would be a claim on his time, it allowed him to pursue his idiosyncratic muse. Ives composed in the evenings, on weekends, and during holidays. For a few years, in the 1890s, he was also an organist and choirmaster at a couple of New York churches.
He retired in 1930, which finally permitted him to devote himself wholeheartedly to music. Ironically, by then, he found he was no longer able to compose. His wife recalled a day in 1927 when he came downstairs with tears in his eyes and confessed that everything sounded wrong to him. Instead he worked at revision and publication.
By the time his works began to gain recognition, he had already stopped writing for 20 years. At the time of his death, in 1954, he was still widely misunderstood and much of his music remained unperformed. Nevertheless, he had some important champions. He was a recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1947, for his Symphony No. 3, “The Camp Meeting,” a work he composed in 1904. The symphony was given its belated premiere, under Lou Harrison’s direction, in 1946.
Arnold Schoenberg regarded Ives as a paragon of artistic integrity. After Schoenberg’s death, his widow found the following among his papers: “There is a great Man living in this Country – a composer. He has solved the problem of how to preserve one’s self-esteem and to learn. He responds to negligence by contempt. He is not forced to accept praise or blame. His name is Ives.”
Here is Ives, in all his patriotic, profane glory, singing “They Are There,” from 1943. Originally written in 1917, for the Great War, the song employs an updated text.
Ives draws on the lesson of the wrap-around marching bands for “The Fourth of July” – and dig the climactic rocket explosion fading away into sparks!
Finally, the work that won Ives his Pulitzer, the Symphony No. 3, “The Camp Meeting”:
Ives’ characteristically gruff reaction: “Prizes are for boys. I’m grown up.” In private, though, he proudly hung the certificate on his wall.
Happy birthday, Charles Ives!
