New England Conservatory Marks Charles Ives's 150th Birthday

New England Conservatory (NEC) honors the 150th anniversary of Charles Ives's birth, celebrating the profound legacy of one of America’s most influential musical pioneers. The series, dubbed "Ives 150," features an array of concerts and public talks throughout 2024, showcasing Ives's significant impact on the landscape of American music. A lifelong New Englander, Charles Ives’s compositions uniquely captured the diverse, multi-layered experiences of life in the United States. The “Ives 150” series will highlight this rich musical heritage through various performances and events.

Bruce Brubaker, Chair of NEC’s Piano Department, is spearheading the programming of Ives’s music and notes for “Ives 150.” “The spirit of New England Transcendentalism lived on in music written by Ives, and he looked to the future,” said Brubaker. “Igor Stravinsky said, ‘Ives quietly set about devouring the contemporary cake before the rest of us even found a seat at the same table.’”

The “Ives 150” series begins in spring 2024 with two piano concerts, each presenting a different facet of Ives’s repertoire. The first concert, on February 27, will showcase earlier, shorter works, including "Three Page Sonata'' and will be juxtaposed with his extended compositions on March 27, including "The Celestial Railroad." Both performances will take place at NEC’s Jordan Hall with free admission upon RSVP.

Two seminars dive into the influences behind Ives’s music, with literary scholar Philip Gura on Transcendentalism on March 1 and Geoffrey Kirsch on "Thoreau and Sound” on March 29. These seminars offer unique insights into the philosophical and literary underpinnings of Ives’s music.

Additionally, a “First Monday” performance pairs Ives’s Songs with Brahms’s Piano Trio No. 1 in B Major, op. 8, offering a captivating contrast of musical styles. The First Monday series, now celebrating its 39th year, features a curated blend of classics and new compositions performed by world-class chamber musicians.

These performances and lectures present a unique opportunity for audiences to be immersed in the world of Charles Ives, a composer who reshaped the landscape of American music.

NEC’s “Ives 150” Performance and Event Details:NEC Piano Department: Ives 150 (Program One)

Tue, February 27, 2024 | 7:30pm | Jordan Hall, 290 Huntington Ave.

Tickets—free with RSVP: https://necmusic.edu/events/nec-piano-department-ives-150-program-one

NEC's Piano Department marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Charles Ives with two programs of his works for piano. The focus of the evening’s program is Ives's shorter and earlier works.

Invention in D (c. 1898)

Minuetto, op. 4 (1886)

Three Page Sonata (1905)

Piano Studies

Study No. 2: Andante moderato - Allegro molto (Varied Air and Variations)

Study No. 5: Moderato con anima (1913)

Study No. 6: Andante (1907-1909)

Study No. 7: Andante cantabile (1907)

Study No. 8: Trio (Allegro moderato - Presto) (1907)

Study No. 9: The Anti-Abolitionist Riots in the 1830s and 1840s (c. 1912-1913)

Study No. 20: March (1910, 1920s): Slow allegro or Fast andante

Study No. 21: Some Southpaw Pitching (1918-1919)

Study No. 22: Andante maestoso - Allegro vivace (1909)

Study No. 23: Allegro (1912-1914; 1920s)

Varied Air and Variations (1920-1922)

Marches for Piano

March No. 1, with "Year of Jubilee" (c. 1894-1895)

March No. 2, with "Son of a Gambolier" [inc.] (1895)

March No. 3, with "Omega Lambda Chi" (c. 1895-1896)

March No. 5, with "Annie Lisle" (c. 1895)

March No. 6, with "Here's to Good Old Yale" (c. 1895-1896)

March in G and C, with "See the Conquering Hero Comes" (1896-1897)

March: The Circus Band (c. 1898-1899)

Piano Seminar: "Thinking Through Thoreau"

Fri, March 1, 2024 | 10:00am | Keller Room, 290 Huntington Ave.

Tickets—free with RSVP: https://necmusic.edu/events/piano-seminar-thinking-through-thoreau

New England Conservatory's Piano Department invites the public to join NEC students in exploring the challenges and complexities that pianists face in the world today, through presentations and master classes by guest artists and NEC faculty.

In today's class, we welcome Philip Gura. As part of the “Ives 150” series at NEC, literary scholar, Philip Gura, will speak on his work regarding Transcendentalism.

First Monday at Jordan Hall: Ives, Brahms

Mon, March 4, 2024 | 7:30pm | Jordan Hall, 290 Huntington Ave.

Tickets—free with RSVP: https://necmusic.edu/events/first-monday-jordan-hall-ives-brahms

Join us as we celebrate 39 years of First Mondays, curated by Artistic Director Laurence Lesser. Programs feature well-loved classics and new compositions, performed by some of the finest chamber musicians in the world, free and open to all. First Mondays are fresh and full of imaginative pairings of well-loved classics and new works, performed in one of the finest places on the planet to hear music of this caliber: NEC’s own Jordan Hall.

Charles Ives | Songs

In the Mornin'

West London

Down East

Watchman

The See'r

The things our fathers loved

From "Paracelsus"

The Innate

Tom Sails Away

Laura Choi Stuart, soprano and Tanya Blaich, piano

Johannes Brahms | Piano Trio No. 1 in B Major, op. 8

George Li, piano

Isabelle Durrenberger, violin

Laurence Lesser, cello

NEC Piano Department: Ives 150 (Ives Extended)

Wed, March 27, 2024 | 7:30pm | NEC: Jordan Hall | 290 Huntington Ave.

Tickets Free with RSVP: https://necmusic.edu/events/nec-piano-department-ives-150-ives-extended

NEC's Piano Department marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Charles Ives with two programs of his works for piano. This evening’s program, “Ives Extended,” includes The Celestial Railroad, the Set of Five Take-Offs, works by Carl Ruggles, Lou Harrison and Henry Cowell, and rarely heard music for two pianos in quarter-tones by Ives, David Fulmer, and Georg Haas.

Charles Ives | The Celestial Railroad (c. 1922–25)

Carl Ruggles | Evocations, Four Chants for Piano

Lou Harrison | Suite for Piano (1943)

Henry Cowell | The Tides of Manaunaun (1917)

Henry Cowell | The Lilt of the Reel (1925)

Henry Cowell | Aeolian Harp (1923)

Henry Cowell | The Banshee (1925)

Charles Ives | Set of Five Take-Offs (c. 1909)

Charles Ives | Three Quarter-Tone Pieces

Georg Friedrich Haas | Hommage à Steve Reich, from Trois Hommages

David Fulmer | Only in darkness is thy shadow clear (2017)

Alvin Lucier (arr. Stephen Drury) | Music for Piano with Magnetic Strings

Piano Seminar: Geoffrey Kirsch

Fri, March 29, 2024 | 10:00am | Keller Room, 290 Huntington Ave.

Tickets Free with RSVP: https://necmusic.edu/events/piano-seminar-geoffrey-kirsch

New England Conservatory's Piano Department invites the public to join NEC students in exploring the challenges and complexities that pianists face in the world today, through presentations and master classes by guest artists and NEC faculty.

In today's class, we welcome Geoffrey Kirsch. As part of the “Ives 150” series at NEC, Geoffrey Kirsch will speak on "Thoreau and Sound."