Ives Thomas San Francicso

MTT, leading American champion of Ives’ work, states: “At its core, the music of Charles Ives is an expression of the heart and soul of America. The complexity of Ives’ rhythmic and harmonic ideas was very much ahead of his time, and, even as he was often labeled eccentric by his peers, he created a uniquely American sound. My aim with this album is to reveal the true essence of Ives’ music in order to allow the audience to see America through his eyes.”

Thelonious Monk - San Francisco Holiday (1992) {Milestone MCD-9199-2 rec 1958-1961}
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© 1958-61, 1992 Milestone Records / Fantasy / Universal | MCD-9199-2 / 0025218919920
Jazz / Bop / Post Bop / Piano

Previously unavailable these tracks, gathered together from four different concert sources, are collected here for the first time on one CD. The first cuts, from a '59 show at New York City's Town Hall, feature extremely energetic performances on three of Monk's best known pieces: "In Walked Bud," "Blue Monk" and "Rhythm-a-Ning" (with a tremendous tenor sax solo by Charlie Rouse, fragmented, lyrical keyboard essays by Monk and a fine, layered solo by beatkeeper Arthur Taylor).

At any rate, Stravinsky traveled to Venice many times, beginning in 1925 and continuing through visits for the first performances of his three commissions from the Biennale, Canticum sacrum ad honorem Sancti Marci nominis (Canticle to Honor the Name of Saint Mark) in 1956; in 1958, the grand late sacred work Threni; and, in 1960, Monumentum pro Gesualdo.

In a second disc of Ives’s songs, the unbeatable partnership of Finley and Drake again enthral their listeners and bring them to the emotional core of each work. The range of style and approach in Ives’s text-setting is startling—from simple, sentimental ballads to complex and strenuous philosophical discourses, sometimes encompassing the most dissonant and virtuosic piano parts, sometimes with the accompaniment pared down to an almost minimalist phrase-repetition. Even those composed in a superficially conventional or ‘polite’ tonal idiom usually contain harmonic, rhythmic or accentual surprises somewhere.

This anthology brings together representative works from the mainstream of contemporary American choral music. Charles Ives’s Psalm 90 evokes a mood reminiscent of congregational Sunday singing in New England. Copland’s In the Beginning recalls his Fanfare for the Common Man, while Lukas Foss’s Behold, I Build An House shows the stylistic influence of Copland. Vincent Persichetti’s Flower Songs reveal his deep commitment to his favourite poet E.E. Cummings, and favours the women’s voices. In Fern Hill, set for alto, chorus and orchestra, composer John Corigliano sings of the joys of youth.