Symphony No. 4, for orchestra (& optional chorus, theremin et alia), S. 4 (K. 1A4) by Charles Ives

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About This Work

Ives' Fourth Symphony is conceived on the largest scale of all his completed orchestral works. Begun in 1910, the first stage of work on the Fourth was complete by 1916. This early version was likely in three movements only, with the opening movement included as an unnumbered "Prelude" and the "Hawthorne Concerto" in the place of the current second movement.

Between 1919-1922 Ives completely recast the second movement into the "comedy" that it is now, using the piano piece The Celestial Railroad as sort of intermediary between the "Concerto" and "comedy." The third movement is an orchestration of the first movement of Ives' String Quartet No. 1 (1898). In 1922-1923, a full ink score of the first three movements was prepared, but the fourth movement had to wait until 1943 when John J. Becker completed this part of the score under Ives' supervision.

The Fourth Symphony calls for an enlarged orchestra augmented with chorus, an extra battery of percussion, organ, and four-hand quarter-tone piano with options for saxophones and { heremin}. While the orchestra retains the main stage, the chorus and percussion is placed throughout the auditorium, achieving a spatial separation that is difficult to transmit via recording. The work requires three conductors, and Ives provides extensive cues in the score to facilitate this.

Ives "aesthetic program" for the Fourth Symphony is "that of a searching question of 'What' and 'Why' which the spirit of man asks of life." The question is stated in the first movement, Prelude: maestoso where the chorus sings an altered setting of the hymn "Watchman, Tell Us of the Night" over a background suggestive of universal space and mystery. The first answer, Allegretto, Ives described as a "comedy" in the transcendental sense; it is a dazzlingly complex collage of tune quotations, representing the confusion of urban existence. Ives punctuates this movement with bizarre effects, including at one point a series of { remolandi} heard throughout the entire orchestra. In the third movement, Fugue, the stoic reserve of religious life as Ives knew it is presented as the second answer to the question. In the final movement, Largo, the distant percussion enters quietly and is joined by the orchestra engaging in a battle between { onally centered} material and discordant, "universal" sounds. The chorus enters singing a wordless, peaceful passage that quells down the whole texture until just the percussion is left, providing the final, transcendental answer to Ives' question.

The first two movements were premiered at Town Hall in New York City under Eugene Goosens in January 1927. Composer Jerome Moross arranged the first and third movements for a New School performance conducted by Bernard Herrmann in 1933. Otherwise, the premiere of the whole work did not occur until 1965 under Leopold Stokowski, {José Serebrier}, and David Katz at Carnegie Hall with the American Symphony Orchestra. ~ All Music Guide