Charles Ives: Complete Symphonies, Los Angeles Philharmonic & Gustavo Dudamel
Last February the first minutes of the Phil’s performance made me realize that all my recordings of this work were worthless.
The pre-concert talk noted that it had been 46 years since the Phil had played it; it should be played all the time.
First of all, making the case that Ives isn’t all collage and cacophony.
1st part: Restrained anxiety. Bernard Herrmann, after all, was a fan. Then, the brats in the back of the room make faces while the adults dance about, very proud of their grace and esprit. Driving steadily forward. Tight and controlled, plaintive without sorrow. At the performance, this movement generated a boisterous response – a loud and clear “Bravo!” despite being warned about the recording.
1.2: Nostalgia and pathos with smudges of irony.
1.3: Athletic skip and swing.
1.4: More elevated gaiety. Is this what CEI means when he says, “Beethoven”? Horns blare out “Columbia”: a scene, a landscape through which diverse moods and tones circulate simultaneously, elevated and otherwise. The middle achieves a polyphonic chaos that’s hair-raising.
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