The Fourth of July by Charles Ives
July 4, 2014
The Fourth of July 1916, Childe Hassam
THOMAS F. BERTONNEAU writes:
In the spirit of the day, here is a link to a performance of the third movement, The Fourth of July, from the New England Holidays Symphony by American composer Charles Ives (1874 – 1954), composed whenever Ives could take a break from the insurance business between 1897 and 1913. Ives was a New Englander, born in Danbury, Connecticut, whose father had been a military bandmaster during the Civil War. The music of Ives remains difficult for many people. My approach to it is to regard it, quite as the composer intended it to be, as a record of experience. In the case of The Fourth of July, Ives gives us in sound what a boy would have heard during the twenty-four hours of the Independence Day celebration. Bands are playing in different parts of the city park and their melodies and rhythms overlap. Choirs sing patriotic and commemorative hymns. Finally, the boys get hold of matches and manage to set off the fireworks display prematurely, but to good effect nevertheless.
— Comments —
JohnP. writes:
I’m glad to read that Prof. Bertonneau shares my enthusiasm for Charles Ives. The meaning of High Modernism in literature and music (and Ives is the root of High Modernism in American music) has been a long standing point of disagreement between my own position and that of many, though not all, Traditionalists. If you don’t compose like Beethoven you’re betraying our culture seems to be the view of many Traditionalists.
Prior to Ives most Harvard educated composers wrote ersatz Beethoven, technically accomplished but not competitive with new European music and not yet truly American.
Ives drew upon American folk music while not ignoring our European patrimony. That makes him among the most seminal composers in American history. He also laid the ground work for future American composers such as Elliot Carter, arguably the greatest classical composer the U.S. has ever produced,(I can write an article on him if you’re interested.)
My view of High Modernism is that it was a living outgrowth of the Western Classical tradition that drew upon centuries of tradition while presenting it in a new and vital way. “Make it new,” wrote T.S. Eliot. This is why the Left ultimately turned against High Modernism, as evidenced by the policies of the USSR and and China, despite the the fact that both T.W. Adorno and Antonio Gramsci were supporters of High Modernism.
