A Sesquicentennial Celebration, hosted by the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music in Bloomington, IN, with contextualized performances, cross-disciplinary talks, and conversations exploring Charles Ives and his place in American history and culture.
All events at the festival are free of charge.
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The leading American concert composer of his time, Charles Ives (1874-1954) is also an iconic American genius whose story links to Transcendentalism, the Civil War, camp meetings, and Wall Street. Charles Ives at 150 will furnish a unique opportunity to freshly explore Ives’s significance in framing the ever-elusive American experience. Too often, he has been viewed as an outsider, an oddball, an accident, an avant-gardist ahead of his time. The central premise of the festival is that Ives vividly exemplifies his own American time and place: the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era.
Curated by eminent Ives scholar J. Peter Burkholder and cultural historian Joseph Horowitz, and supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, this cross-disciplinary festival will be by far the most ambitious celebration of Ives’s Sesquicentennial.
Festival performances will showcase the breadth of Ives’s output, including the Second and Third Symphonies; the symphonic poems Three Places in New England, The Unanswered Question, and Central Park in the Dark; both piano sonatas; major works for band and chamber orchestra; choral music from The Celestial Country to Psalm 90; both string quartets; all four violin sonatas; and innumerable songs.
Pianists Jeremy Denk, Gilbert Kalish, and Steven Mayer; violinist Stefan Jackiw; and baritone William Sharp will join Jacobs School of Music faculty — conductor Arthur Fagen; mezzo soprano Mary Ann Hart; and the Pacifica Quartet — and IU students in the Orchestral, Choral, Wind, and Chamber Ensembles.
All the concerts will be framed as public humanities events, incorporating commentary and discussion.
Participating scholars include art historian Tim Barringer, historians Allen Guelzo and Alan Lessoff, musicologists J. Peter Burkholder, Judith Tick and Denise Von Glahn; music theorists David Thurmaier, Chelsey Hamm, and Derek J. Myler; cultural historians David Michael Hertz and Joseph Horowitz; editor James B. Sinclair; and others to come — watch this space!
Supported in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities
FESTIVAL SCHEDULE
TBD (before festival)
Charles Ives’s America, a documentary film featuring Joseph Horowitz, J. Peter Burkholder, Steven Mayer, William Sharp, James B. Sinclair, and Judith Tick, produced by Joseph Horowitz for Naxos with visuals by Peter Bogdanoff
TBD
Voice master class on the Ives songs with Mary Ann Hart
MONDAY, SEPT. 30
8:00 pm | Auer Hall
Festival Opening Event
Song recital with readings: Charles Ives: A Life in Music – William Sharp, baritone, and Steven Mayer, piano
Post-concert discussion with the audience
TUESDAY, OCT. 1
1:15-2:30 pm | TBD
Voice master class on the Ives songs with William Sharp
8:00 pm | Musical Arts Center
Band Showcase: Ives Works and Transcriptions for Band
Symphonic Band and Concert Band – Eric Smedley and Jason Nam, conductors, with commentary by J. Peter Burkholder
- Ives: Fugue in C, arr. James B. Sinclair
- Ives: Finale from Symphony No. 2, arr. Jonathan Elkus
- Ives: Decoration Day, arr. Jonathan Elkus
- Ives: March “Omega Lambda Chi”
Symphonic Band — Eric Smedley, conductor
- Ives: March “Intercollegiate”
- Ives: Old Home Days Suite, arr. Jonathan Elkus
- Ives: They Are There!, arr. James B. Sinclair
- Ives: Variations on “America”, arr. Tiffany Galus
Concert Band — Jason Nam, conductor
Post-concert discussion with the audience
WEDNESDAY, OCT. 2
5:00 pm | Ford-Crawford Hall
Music Theory Colloquium: Ives and Current Music Theory
- Chelsey Hamm (Christopher Newport University)
- Derek J. Myler (East Carolina University)
- David Thurmaier (University of Missouri-Kansas City)
Music Theory Five Friends Master Class Series – honoring Robert Samels
8:00 pm | Auer Hall
The Four Ives Violin Sonatas
Stefan Jackiw, violin, Jeremy Denk, piano, with commentary by J. Peter Burkholder and songs by TBD
- Ives: Violin Sonata No. 4
- Ives: Violin Sonata No. 3
- Ives: Violin Sonata No. 2
- Ives: Violin Sonata No. 1
Post-concert discussion with the audience
THURSDAY, OCT. 3
5:00 pm | Auer Hall
Ives songs and/or piano works
IU Jacobs School of Music Voice and Piano Faculty and Students
8:00 pm | Auer Hall
Ives chamber and chamber orchestra works
New Music Ensemble – David Dzubay, director, with commentary by James B. Sinclair, Paul Borg, and Derek J. Myler
- Ives: Set for Theater Orchestra
- Ives: Set No. 6 for Chamber Orchestra (comments by James B. Sinclair)
- Ives: Three Quarter-tone Pieces for two pianos (comments by Paul Borg)
- Ives: A Set of Three Short Pieces for string quartet and double bass
- Ives: Central Park in the Dark (comments by Derek Myler)
Post-concert discussion with the audience
FRIDAY, OCT. 4
12:30 pm | Ford-Crawford Hall
Musicology Colloquium: Keynote Event
- J. Peter Burkholder (Musicology, IUB)
- Joseph Horowitz (cultural historian)
1:45 pm | Ford Hall
Session 1: Ives and Nature
- Joseph Horowitz on Ives and nature, with William Sharp and Steven Mayer
- Tim Barringer (Art History, Yale University) on Ives and American painters
- Derek J. Myler (Music Theory, East Carolina University) on The Housatonic at Stockbridge
- Melody Barnett Deusner and Cordula Grewe (Art History, IUB), discussants
5:00 pm | Auer Hall
Ives songs and/or piano works
IU Jacobs School of Music Voice and Piano Faculty and Students
8:00 pm | Auer Hall
The Ives String Quartets
Pacifica Quartet, with commentary by J. Peter Burkholder
- Ives: Scherzo for String Quartet
- Ives: String Quartet No. 1
- Ives: String Quartet No. 2
Post-concert discussion with the audience
SATURDAY, OCT. 5
9:00 am | Ford-Crawford Hall
Session 2: Ives and His Time: Challenging Stereotypes of the “Gilded Age”
- Alan Lessoff (History, Illinois State University) on the Gilded Age
- Joseph Horowitz, Allen C. Guelzo (History, Princeton University), Wendy Gamber (History, IUB), and Eric Sandweiss (History, IUB), discussants
- Ivan Shulman on Ives’s neighbor Luemily Ryder
10:45 am | Ford-Crawford Hall
Session 3: Ives and American Wars
- Allen C. Guelzo (History, Princeton University) on Ives’s Civil War
- Denise Von Glahn (Musicology, Florida State University) on The “St. Gaudens” in Boston Common, Putnam’s Camp, and From Hanover Square North
- Chelsey Hamm (Music Theory, Christopher Newport University) on the World War I songs
12:30 pm | Lunch Break
2:00 pm | Ford-Crawford Hall
Session 4: Ives, American Music, and American Culture
- J. Peter Burkholder on Ives’s four musical traditions and the music on today’s concerts
- David Thurmaier (Music Theory, University of Missouri-Kansas City) on Ives and American music
- Allen C. Guelzo (History, Princeton University), “Harmonies of the Let-Out Souls: The Serene Vision of Charles Ives’s Third Symphony”
- Joseph Horowitz, Tim Barringer, Alan Lessoff, and Denise Von Glahn, discussants
4:00 pm | Auer Hall
Mixed Ensemble and Solo Concert
- Ives: Piano Sonata No. 1
Gilbert Kalish, piano - Ives: Symphony No. 3: The Camp Meeting
Chamber Orchestra – Jeff Meyer, conductor - Other performers TBD
Post-concert discussion with the audience
7:00 pm | Musical Arts Center Mezzanine
Pre-concert Talk: “Ives, American Places, and the Civil War” – Allen C. Guelzo (History, Princeton University) and Denise Von Glahn (Musicology, Florida State University)
8:00 pm | Musical Arts Center
Charles Ives’s America
Philharmonic Orchestra – Arthur Fagen, conductor, with commentary by J. Peter Burkholder, visuals by Peter Bogdanoff, and songs by William Sharp, baritone, and Steven Mayer, piano
- Ives: The Unanswered Question
- Ives: The Circus Band
- Ives: The Housatonic at Stockbridge
- Ives: Three Places in New England
- Ives: Symphony No. 2
Post-concert discussion with the audience
SUNDAY, OCT. 6
10:00 am | First Presbyterian Church
Sunday service with Ives choral anthems and organ music, celebrating his fourteen-year career as a church organist and choirmaster
Christopher Young, organist; Ryan Rogers, choirmaster
2:00-5:00 pm | Auer Hall
Recital and Session 5: Ives, the Concord Sonata, and American Literature
- Ives: Piano Sonata No. 2: Concord, Mass. 1840-60
Steven Mayer, piano, with readings by William Sharp - Panel discussion with Joseph Horowitz, David M. Hertz (Comparative Literature, IUB), and others
- Summary discussion with audience and all festival participants
MONDAY, OCT. 7
8:00 pm | Auer Hall
Ives songs and/or piano works
IU Jacobs School of Music Voice and Piano Faculty and Student
TUESDAY, OCT. 8
8:00 pm | Auer Hall
Ives Choral Music
NOTUS – Dominick DiOrio, director, with commentary by J. Peter Burkholder
- Ives: Psalm 100
- Ives: Crossing the Bar
- Ives: Psalm 90
- Ives: Psalm 67
- Ives: The Celestial Country
Post-concert discussion with the audience
LODGING OPTIONS IN BLOOMINGTON
We have blocks of rooms reserved at two lovely hotels in Bloomington.
IMU Biddle Hotel
(812) 856-6381
- Hotel Group Code: IVES24
- Room Rate: $120.60-$174.60 per room, per night
- Block Release Date: September 1, 2024
Hyatt Place Bloomington
(812) 339-5950
- Hotel Group Code: G-IUJM (also built into link above, just select your dates)
- Room Rate: $169
- Block Release Date: Friday, Aug. 30