Charles Ives’ vision of America still strikes an unsettling chord

Charles Ives’ vision of America still strikes an unsettling chord toggle caption Bettman/Bettman/Getty Images One hundred-fifty years ago, a mild-mannered insurance man was born in the small Connecticut town of Danbury. In his memoirs, dictated to a secretary in 1930, Ives remembers his father saying, “If you know how to write a fugue the right way, then I’m willing to have you try the wrong way.” Sponsor Message So much of Ives’ music sounds, at least at first hearing, like it was indeed composed the “wrong way.” Ives challenged traditional music theory. It makes no sense.’” Denk places the sonata among Ives’ most aspiring works and describes its eerie central movement in the album liner notes as “a jagged musical reflection on the Civil War.” Sponsor Message There’s a kind of freewheeling, “Watch me build it,” swagger in Ives’ music that sounds unmistakably American. That da-da-da-daaa theme will eventually evolve into some of Ives’ most tender music in the movement titled “The Alcotts.” At another point in the sonata’s “Hawthorn” section, Ives specifies that a narrow wooden board, exactly 14 -3/4 inches long, be used to depress multiple keys at once.