Songs, Vol. 2

"It is taking a long time for singers and the public to appreciate the full extent and importance of Ives' output of songs. Not as large as Schubert maybe, but still a major achievement. The title alone of the main published source-"114 Songs" (1922)-gives an idea of its scope but there are in fact nearly 200 songs in all. Surprisingly, however, this appears to be the first attempt to record the completed songs in their entirety and, whatever shortcomings there may be in its realisation, this series must be an issue of major importance for anyone with an interest in Ives or indeed in song or in American music in general.

Previous recordings of the songs have usually involved a single singer. A small number of songs have found their way onto many of these discs. Of those on the present discs, "General William Booth enters into Heaven", "The Greatest Man", "The Circus Band" and "Ann Street" are amongst this group. What is remarkable is the number of what are to me at least wholly unfamiliar. It may at first seem arbitrary for Naxos to have put the songs into alphabetical order, and indeed it does lead to some strange companions, but the alternatives of arranging them by author, theme or date would run a much greater risk of monotony. On the whole I have no doubt that Naxos have chosen the better option. It means that we hear early songs strongly rooted in American domestic and social music of the late nineteenth century alongside songs completed towards the end of his active composing life; the latter are of a drastically different character. This may be disconcerting at times but constantly draws attention to the Ives' range as a composer.

Although all were recorded at Yale University, Naxos have divided the songs between a large group of singers and pianists, mainly young Americans. They have even made use of an organ and a string quartet in three instances. Overall the listener can have no doubt of the seriousness with which the project has been undertaken. Each disc has a brief but helpful introduction to each song as well as much longer biographies and photographs of the performers.

All of this is immensely praiseworthy… for the many novelties which they include, and for the way in which they demonstrate the range and quality of Ives' songs."
MusicWeb International, December 17, 2008

"The virtue of this series is its completeness, and for those who are fascinated by the strange genius of Charles Ives (including me), it is an attractive exploration."
The Manchester Evening News

When, in 1922, Charles Ives published a volume entitled 114 Songs, he was likely drawing attention to the fact that the genre had played a central part in his output. 85 years on and, for all that his wider reputation may now rest on his orchestral, chamber and piano music, it is the songs that represent the heart of his creative thinking. Nor was that initial volume at all comprehensive; Ives having written almost 200 songs, of which this present edition includes all of those he completed. The expressive variety encountered is accordingly vast: indeed, the gradual evolution of Ives's songwriting, from those that draw overtly on the Austro-German Lieder and English parlour-song traditions to ones that evince an anarchic humour as keenly as others do a profound vision, is surely analogous to the wider evolution of American music over the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Although it would be entirely possible to collate Ives's songs according to type, the alphabetic approach adopted by this edition ensures each volume (of which this disc is the second) contains a representative cross-section. A considerable range of poets is set (and Ives could be highly interventionist as and when it suited his purpose), including a number of (mainly early) German settings and forays into French and Italian. The temporal distance (1887-1926) traversed by the songs is as little compared to their stylistic diversity or their emotional range.