Charles Ives facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Charles Ives
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Portrait c. 1947
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| Born | October 20, 1874 |
| Died | May 19, 1954 (aged 79) New York City, US
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| Occupation | Composer, actuary, businessman |
| Spouse(s) |
Harmony Twichell
(m. 1908) |
Charles Edward Ives (born October 20, 1874 – died May 19, 1954) was an American composer, actuary, and businessman. He was one of the first American composers to become famous around the world. At first, many people didn't pay much attention to his music. A lot of his pieces weren't even performed for many years.
Later in his life, other musicians like Henry Cowell and Lou Harrison helped show how special his music was. People then started to see him as a truly original American artist. Ives was also one of the first composers to try out new and experimental ways of making music. He used techniques like playing in more than one key at once (polytonality) and using different rhythms at the same time (polyrhythm). He also experimented with tone clusters (many notes played together) and even quarter tones (notes between the usual ones).
These experiments were very advanced for his time. They predicted many musical ideas that became popular later in the 20th century. Because of this, Charles Ives is often seen as the most important American composer of classical music from that era. His music often included familiar sounds like hymn tunes, traditional songs, and melodies from town bands and patriotic events.
Contents
Charles Ives: An American Music Pioneer
Early Life and Musical Beginnings
Family and First Lessons
Charles Ives was born in Danbury, Connecticut, on October 20, 1874. His father, George Ives, was a bandleader in the American Civil War. His mother was Mary Elizabeth Ives. The Ives family had lived in Connecticut for a long time and was well-known in Danbury. They were involved in business and helped improve their community. They also supported important social changes in the 1800s, like ending slavery.
George Ives was a talented musician. He led bands, choirs, and orchestras. He also taught music theory and many instruments. Charles learned a lot by listening to his father's marching band. He would hear different bands playing at the same time in the town square. His father taught Charles and his brother, Joseph Moss Ives, about music, harmony, and how to compose. George encouraged Charles to try new things with music, even using different keys at once. Charles also learned many traditional American songs from his father.
Young Organist and Experimenter
Charles became a church organist when he was just 14 years old. He wrote hymns and songs for church services. One of his early pieces was Variations on "America". He wrote it for a Fourth of July concert in Brewster, New York. This piece is still considered difficult for organists today. But Charles famously said it was "as much fun as playing baseball" when he was young.
College Years and Career Choices
Yale and Sports
In 1893, Ives moved to New Haven, Connecticut, to attend the Hopkins School. There, he was the captain of the baseball team. In September 1894, he started at Yale University. He studied music with Horatio Parker, a well-known composer. At Yale, Charles wrote church music and even a campaign song for William McKinley in 1896. Sadly, his father passed away on November 4, 1894. This was a very difficult time for Charles, but he continued the musical experiments he had started with his father. His brother Moss later became a lawyer.
At Yale, Charles was a popular student. He was part of several student groups and enjoyed sports. He even played on the university's American football team. His coach once said it was a shame Charles spent so much time on music. He thought Charles could have been a champion runner. His pieces Calcium Light Night and Yale-Princeton Football Game show how much college and sports influenced his music. He wrote his Symphony No. 1 as his final project for his music studies. Charles continued working as a church organist until May 1902.
A Career in Insurance
After graduating from Yale in 1898, Charles started working in the insurance business. He first worked for the Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York. Then, in 1899, he moved to Charles H. Raymond & Co. In 1907, he and his friend Julian Myrick started their own company, Ives & Co., which later became Ives & Myrick. He worked there until he retired.
During his time as an insurance executive, Ives came up with new ways to help people plan their finances for the future. His ideas helped create what we now call estate planning. His book, Life Insurance with Relation to Inheritance Tax, published in 1918, was very successful. He became quite famous in the insurance world. Many of his business partners were surprised to learn he was also a composer. In his free time, and before he got married, he composed music and worked as an organist in different towns.
Charles Ives's Unique Music Style
Exploring New Sounds
In 1907, Ives experienced some health challenges. After recovering, he entered one of the most creative periods of his life as a composer. In 1908, he married Harmony Twichell. She was the daughter of a minister. The couple moved into an apartment in New York.
Ives had a very successful career in insurance. He also continued to write a lot of music. However, after another period of health issues around 1918, he composed much less. His last known piece, the song "Sunrise," was written in August 1926. In 1922, Ives published a collection called 114 Songs. This book showed how wide-ranging his music was. It included traditional songs, pieces he wrote as a teenager, and very experimental, dissonant (clashing) songs.
His wife recalled that in early 1927, Ives came downstairs with tears in his eyes. He said he couldn't compose anymore because "nothing sounds right." Many people have wondered why he stopped composing in his later years. It remains a mystery, much like why the famous composer Jean Sibelius also stopped writing music around the same time. Even though Ives stopped creating new music and faced health problems, he kept working on his older pieces. He also helped arrange for his music to be performed for the first time.
Famous Compositions
Ives's musical journey began when he played drums in his father's band as a young boy. He published many songs, often with piano parts. He also wrote two string quartets and other chamber music pieces. Today, he is best known for his music for orchestras. His work as an organist led him to write Variations on "America" in 1891. He first performed this piece at a Fourth of July concert.
He composed four numbered symphonies. He also wrote other pieces with "Symphony" in their titles. One famous work is The Unanswered Question (1908). It's written for an unusual group of instruments: a trumpet, four flutes, and a string quartet. This piece was inspired by American writers like Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.
Around 1910, Ives started creating some of his most important works. These include the Holiday Symphony and Three Places in New England. His Piano Sonata No. 2: Concord, Mass., 1840-60, often called the Concord Sonata, is one of his most famous pieces. He began working on it in 1911 and finished most of it by 1915. However, it wasn't published until 1920, and a revised version came out in 1947. This sonata shows how much he loved to experiment. In one part, he tells the pianist to use a 14+3⁄4 in (37 cm) piece of wood to play many notes at once, creating a huge, rich sound. The piece also uses parts of other famous music. For example, the beginning of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony appears in every movement.
Another important orchestral piece by Ives is his Symphony No. 4. He worked on it from 1910 to 1916 and made more changes in the 1920s. This symphony has four movements and is known for being very complex and using a large orchestra. It wasn't fully performed until 1965, which was half a century after he finished it and more than ten years after he passed away. Ives also left behind ideas for an unfinished Universe Symphony. He worked on it for two decades but couldn't complete it due to his health and changing ideas.
Later Life and Legacy
Health and Creative Challenges
After facing ongoing health problems, including diabetes, Charles Ives retired from his insurance business in 1930. Even though he now had more time for music, he found he couldn't write any new pieces. During the 1940s, he revised his Concord Sonata, and it was published again in 1947. An earlier version of the sonata and a book of essays that went with it, Essays Before a Sonata, were printed privately in 1920.
Ives's Impact on Music
Charles Ives passed away from a stroke in 1954 in New York City. His wife, Harmony, lived until 1969. She left the money earned from his music to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. This money helps fund the Charles Ives Prize, which supports new composers. Ives's unique and experimental approach to music has inspired many musicians who came after him. He showed that American composers could create truly original and challenging works.
Beyond Music: Ives's Other Ideas
Ideas for Government
Ives was also interested in politics and how society worked. In 1920, he suggested a new amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This amendment would let citizens propose laws to Congress. Then, Congress would choose 10 of these ideas each year for the public to vote on. He even paid to print thousands of pamphlets about his idea. These pamphlets talked about the need to reduce "THE EFFECTS OF TOO MUCH POLITICS IN OUR representative DEMOCRACY." He wanted to hand them out at the 1920 Republican National Convention, but they arrived too late.
Ives was very passionate about his ideas. One story tells of a strong disagreement he had with a young Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War I. Ives believed that war bonds should be sold in small amounts, like $50, so more people could buy them. Roosevelt, who was on a war bonds committee with Ives, initially thought a $50 bond was "useless." However, many years later, Roosevelt changed his mind about small contributions. This was seen when he supported the March of Dimes to fight polio, which relied on many small donations.
List of Charles Ives's Works
It's sometimes hard to know the exact dates for Ives's compositions. This is because he often made different versions of the same piece. Also, his music wasn't widely known during his lifetime. The dates here are often educated guesses. Some people have even suggested he purposely changed the dates of his own pieces.
- Variations on "America" for organ (1892)
- The Circus Band (a march about a circus coming to town)
- Psalm settings (14, 42, 54, 67, 90, 135, 150) (1890s)
- String Quartet No. 1, From the Salvation Army (1897–1900)
- Symphony No. 1 in D minor (1898–1901)
- Symphony No. 2 (Ives gave dates of 1899–1902; analysis of handwriting and manuscript paper suggests 1907–1909)
- Symphony No. 3, The Camp Meeting (1908–10)
- Central Park in the Dark, a sound collage for chamber orchestra (1906, 1909)
- The Unanswered Question for chamber group (1908; rev. 1934)
- Piano Sonata No. 1 (1909–16)
- Emerson Concerto (1913–19)
- The Gong on the Hook & Ladder (Firemen's Parade on Main Street) for orchestra, Kv 28
- Tone Roads for orchestra No. 1, 'All Roads Lead To the Center' KkV38
- A set of 3 Short Pieces, A, Kk W15, No 1 'Largo Cantabile – Hymn' for string quartet & double-bass
- Hallowe'en for string quartet, piano, & bass drum, Kw11
- Piano Trio (c. 1909–10, rev. c. 1914–15)
- Violin Sonata No. 1 (1910–14; rev. c. 1924)
- Violin Sonata No. 4, Children's Day at the Camp Meeting (1911–16)
- A Symphony: New England Holidays (1904–13)
- "Robert Browning" Overture (1911–14)
- Symphony No. 4 (1912–18; rev. 1924–26)
- String Quartet No. 2 (1913–15)
- Pieces for chamber ensemble grouped as "Sets", some called Cartoons or Take-Offs or Songs Without Voices (1906–18); includes Calcium Light Night
- Three Places in New England (Orchestral Set No. 1) (1910–14; rev. 1929)
- Violin Sonata No. 2 (1914–17)
- Violin Sonata No. 3 (1914–17)
- Orchestral Set No. 2 (1915–19)
- Piano Sonata No. 2, Concord, Mass., 1840–60 (1916–19) (revised many times by Ives)
- Universe Symphony (incomplete, 1915–28, worked on symphony until his death in 1954)
- 114 Songs (composed various years 1887–1921, published 1922.)
- Three Quarter Tone Piano Pieces (1923–24)
- Orchestral Set No. 3 (incomplete, 1919–26, notes added after 1934)
See also
In Spanish: Charles Ives para niños
