Charles Ives was born in Danbury, Connecticut. His father George Ives was a U.S. Army bandleader in the American Civil War. His mother was a singer. His father taught him a great deal about the music and encouraged him to experiment with new sounds. As well as teaching him counterpoint and introducing him to the music of J.S.Bach he trained his son’s musical ear by getting him to sing a tune in one key while he played the accompaniment in another. In this way the young Charles became used to modern sounds that were quite different from traditional, Romantic music. Charles also listened in Danbury town square to his father's marching band and other bands that were playing on other sides of the square, so that he heard a mixture of several pieces of music at the same time. His father also taught him the music of Stephen Foster.
Ives became a church organist at the age of 14 and wrote various hymns and songs for church services, including his "Variations on 'America' ". At the same time he also enjoyed sport and was good at baseball, football and tennis.
Ives spent four years at Yale University. His teacher Horatio Parker was very good and taught him important basic techniques of composing, but he could not understand some of things that Ives was writing in his music. Ives got annoyed when his teacher told him he could not finish a section of music on a dissonant chord, but Ives liked it like that. The choirmaster at the Centre Church where Ives played the organ was John Griggs. He had more understanding of what Ives was trying to do. It was a terrible blow to Charles when his father died on 4 November 1894. He always had a huge admiration for his father who had encouraged him in his musical experiments. Charles kept busy composing. He did not do any sport at Yale because his father had forbidden him to take part in sport so that he would spend his time on studying. By the time Charles graduated he had composed more than 40 songs, several marches, overtures, anthems and organ pieces, a string quartet and a symphony. However, most people thought of him as the composer of a simple waltz tune called "The Bells of Yale".
After his studies at Yale Ives continued to work as a church organist while working for an insurance firm. He was very good at his job and became very well known in the insurance business. Some of his business friends were often surprised to find out that he was also a composer.
In 1907, Ives had his first "heart attack". These attacks may have been more to do with his imagination. When he was better he composed more than ever before. He married in 1908. After several heart attacks in 1918 he composed very little. He stopped composing altogether in 1926. His health problems continued, and he retired from the insurance business in 1930. He spent some time revising works he had written early, but never wrote any more new pieces.
Ives died in 1954 in New York City at 12:32 PM.
Ives published more than 100 of his songs. He was a very good pianist and the piano parts are often quite difficult. They include bitonality and pantonality.. Although he is now best known for his orchestral music, he composed two string quartets and other chamber music. His organ piece "Variations on "America"" (1891), takes the tune "My Country, 'Tis of Thee" (which is the same tune as "God Save the Queen ") and changes it in several amusing variations, using a march, a ragtime and bitonality. it was not published until 1949. The variations differ sharply: a running line, a set of close harmonies, a march, a polonaise, and a ragtime allegro; the interludes are one of the first uses of bitonality.
His "Symphony Number 1" was fairly traditional, but "Symphony Number 2" is much more modern sounding, even ending with a dissonant chord with 11 notes.
In 1902 he gave up his organ job. He left all his best anthems and organ music in the church library, and these were thrown out in 1915 when the church moved so most of them are lost.
"Central Park in the Dark" is a piece for orchestra which describes the mysterious, quiet park and then sounds of music coming from nearby nightclubs in Manhattan (playing the popular music of the day, ragtime, quoting "Hello My Baby" and even Sousa's "Washington Post March").
Perhaps the piece which is most often heard today is the short fanfare "The Unanswered Question" (1908), written for the very unusual combination of trumpet, four flutes, and string orchestra. The strings, playing from behind the stage, play very slow, chorale-like music throughout the piece while several times the trumpet (playing from behind the audience) plays a short group of notes that Ives described as "the eternal question of existence". Each time the trumpet is answered with harsh outbursts from the flutes (onstage) — apart from the last one. That is the question that is left unanswered. Musicians often have discussions about what the real meaning of the piece is.
Another well-known orchestral work is "Three Places in New England". His best-known piano work is his "Concord Sonata". Ives often liked to quote bits of other pieces, and in this piano sonata he quotes the famous opening of Beethoven's "Fifth Symphony". It also has an interesting example of one of Ives' experiments: in the second movement, he tells the pianist to use a 14¾ in (37.5 cm) piece of wood to make a thick but soft cluster chord. The sonata is one of the best piano works of the 20th century.
One of his most interesting works is the his "Fourth Symphony" (1910–16) written for a huge orchestra. The last movement is like a fight between discord and traditional tonal music. The piece ends quietly with just the percussion playing at a distance. This symphony seems to say everything that Ives had been trying to do in music. It was not until 1965 that a complete performance of the symphony was given.
Ives’ music only gradually began to get well known during the 1930s and into the 1940s. Schoenberg recognized his importance. In 1951, Leonard Bernstein conducted the first performance of Ives' Second Symphony in a broadcast concert by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. He recorded a lot of his music and even played some in a television programme for young people.
Flageolet
A flageolet is an old woodwind instrument. It belongs to the end-blown flute family. It started to be used in the 16th century for folk music. Soon there were two kinds: the French kind and the English. The French flageolet had four holes in the front and two in the back. The English flageolet had six holes in the front.
The flageolet is quite similar to the recorder. In the 18th century it changed because a narrow mouthpiece made of ivory or bone was added at the top. This led into another section which bulged out. There was a soft sponge at the end of this. Sometimes this instrument was called the "flautino". The piccolo developed from it. Another instrument that developed from it was the tin whistle.
Henry Purcell and George Frideric Handel both wrote pieces for it.
Small versions of this instrument, called bird flageolets were also made and were used for teaching birds to sing.
The illustrated Encyclopedia of Musical Instruments;
Paris Opera
Paris Opéra or the Opéra National de Paris is the most important opera company of France. It stages performances at the Opéra Bastille and Opéra Garnier in Paris. The theatre is also the home of the Paris Opéra Ballet.
Other opera houses in Paris are the Théâtre du Châtelet, Opéra-Comique and Théâtre des Champs-Élysées.
King Louis XIV allowed Jean-Baptiste Lully to start the "Académie Royale de Musique" in 1672. This was an organization that included opera, ballet, and music. The ballet company was part of the opera company. Then Louis XIV started the ballet school, called "Académie Royale de Danse", in 1661. From 1671 until Lully's death in 1687, the school was directed by the great dancing master Pierre Beauchamp, the man who set down the five positions of the feet.