Charles Ives: Sonata No. 2 "Concord" - Hawthorne

Sonata No. 2, "Concord, Mass., 1840-60"
II. Hawthorne

John Kirkpatrick, piano.

"[Hawthorne] is but an 'extended fragment' trying to suggest some of his wilder, fantastical adventures into the half-childlike, half-fairylike phantasmal realms. It may have something to do with the children's excitement on that 'frosty Berkshire morning, and the frost imagery on the enchanted hall window' or something to do with 'Feathertop,' the 'Scarecrow,' and his 'Looking Glass' and the little demons dancing around his pipe bowl; or something to do with the old hymn tune that haunts the church and sings only to those in the churchyard, to protect them from secular noises, as when the circus parade comes down Main Street; or something to do with the concert at the Stamford camp meeting, or the 'Slave's Shuffle'; or something to do with the Concord he-nymph, or the 'Seven Vagabonds,' or 'Circe's Palace,' or something else in the wonderbook -- not something that happens, but the way something happens; or something to do with the "Celestial Railroad," or "Phoebe's Garden," or something personal, which tries to be "national" suddenly at twilight, and universal suddenly and midnight; or something about the ghost of a man who never lived, or about something that never will happen, or something else that is not."

-C.E.I.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• hawthorne
• scarlet
• letter
• celestial
• railroad
• ghosts
• puritanism
• ives
• concord
• massachusetts
• piano
• sonata
• kirkpatrick
• kalish
• beethoven
• avantgarde
• 20th-century
• american
• hymns
• oop
• transcendentalism

[privatecustomer]

We have much to thank Mr Kirkpatrick for bringing this Sonata to our attention. No one before him had worked this piece up for the public and for recording. I like what he did during the slow hymn section where he added some of the 4th Symphony accompaniment. Everyone has different ideas as to how any music is performed, I find myself leaning more toward the Robert Zidone rendition on the DeutchGrammaphone label, sorry for the misspelling, that came out in the early 70s.

[jamesrudess]

Thanks again for uploading this recording. I really wish there were some videos of this being played up on youtube.

[Poochinnie]

Nice music... I used think that my piano playing style was original ... Until I Hear this ......now i cant believe that Ives composed this in 1911