Celeste Hutchins<\/p>\n
Proseminar<\/p>\n
10 September 2003<\/p>\n
Postmodernist Ives<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Kramer is correct in
\nconcluding that Ives is not a “pre-postmodernist.” Although Ives aesthetic is clearly very forward thinking,
\nhis intentions are not and he borders on being a romantic. Kramer’s article starts
\nwith a definition of postmodernism “as a recurrent movement within modernism.”
\nDespite working with a definition that frees postmodernism from time
\nconstraints, it still supposes that a “pre-postmodernist” would embrace current
\ncultural values. This situation would be exception, especially since music
\ntends to lag 50 years or more behind the other arts in following
\nmovements. Ives, as a
\ntranscendentalist, is no exception. Cowell, in his biography of Ives, (really a hagiography) Charles Ives
\nand His Music<\/i>,
\nidentifies Ives as a follower of Emerson. Cowell writes, “By that time Emerson’s thinking had been shaping
\nAmerican minds for more than sixty years . . ..” (p. 8) Ives is thus not at the
\nforefront of philosophical thought, but identifies with the values of a
\nprevious generation.<\/p>\n
His song, The Things
\nOur Fathers Loved<\/i>
\nsimilarly esteems a bygone era. In this case, it idealizes community bands like
\nthe one Ives’ father conducted. It
\npraises small town life, which, as Kramer points out, was already
\ndisappearing. Thus it represents
\n“nostalgia for the unattainable,” and promotes nostalgic values. He has similar
\nromantic yearnings in other works. Cowell describes a short piece for vocalist and piano. Ives notes that four measures of the
\npiece would sound better played on a string quartet than a piano and a quartet
\nshould be used for those measures if possible. “Four string players are not usually on hand at a song
\nrecital to play just the four measures that sound better with strings than they
\ndo with a piano, but of course from the composer’s point of view they should
\nbe. Ives exclaims: ‘Why can’t a
\nmusical thought be presented as it is born?'” (Cowell p. 10) This idea of spontaneity could have
\ncome directly from one of the romantic poets.<\/p>\n
Kramer’s claims as to
\nIves’ misogyny are also amply documented. In the song An Election<\/i>, the vocalist sings,
\n“some old women: male and female.” That line certainly “conforms to what classical psychoanalysis calls the
\nmasculine protest.” (Kramer p. 183) Cowell approvingly records Ives’ (masculine) protest against Haydn, “Easy
\nMusic for the sissies, for the lilypad ears of Rollo!” (p. 10) Rollo is
\nexplained in a footnote on the same page, “An imaginary gentleman named Rollo
\nis a familiar of the Ives household – one of those white-livered weaklings who
\ncannot stand up and receive the full force of dissonance like a man.” Thus Ives’ dissonance stems not from a “[search]
\nfor new presentations . . . in order to impart a stronger sense of the
\nunpresentable,” (Lyotard) but from “a dread of being feminized.” (Kramer p.
\n183) This is especially clear when
\nIves complains about the New York Symphony Orchestra’s response to Washington’s
\nBirthday<\/i>. They asked him to cut out some of the
\ndissonance. He wrote, “They made
\nan awful fuss about playing it, and before I got through, this had to be cut
\nout, and that had to be cut out, and in the end, the score was practically emasculated<\/i>.” [emphasis mine]
\n(Cowell p. 68) Dissonance is thus very clearly linked in Ives’ mind to manliness
\nand virility. <\/p>\n
Kramer also describes
\nflute as phallic. (p. 197) Although this may seem absurd, given the flute’s current association of
\nfemininity, the flute was recently considered a manly instrument. Flutist Polly Moller told me that one
\nhundred years ago, the flute occupied the cultural position currently held by
\nthe electric guitar. Middle class
\nwhite boys learned to play them and tried to master them, much like some of
\nthem now try to sound like commercials for Guitar Center. Therefore, if Ives’ use of the flute is
\ndesigned to convey manliness, it is intended to convey the culture of the white
\nmale middle class.<\/p>\n
Kramer
\ngoes on to describe Ives as homophobic, based on his misogyny and fear of
\nemasculation. Ives’ disassociation with Cowell seems to confirm this, however I
\ndisagree with the thesis that misogyny leads directly to homophobia. Sometimes
\nmale homosexuality is presented as a hyper-manliness, for example in the
\ndrawings of Tom of Finland or among the Brown shirts of 1930’s Germany. In any case, Cowell’s writing reveals
\nno tinges of discomfort as he joins Ives in condemning Rollo and the sissies. However, if “Ives’ obsessive degradation of the feminine” is any sort of
\na “response to the social conditions surrounding concert music in the late nineteenth
\ncentury,” (Kramer p. 183) then Cowell’s approval could similarly stem from
\nsocial conditions surrounding male homosexuality. Perhaps both of them were avoiding the sissy label – applied
\nto male musicians and gay men alike.<\/p>\n
Ives’
\ndesire to avoid “pretty little sugar plum sounds,” (Cowell p. 10) is clearly
\nevident in his masterwork Symphony No. 4<\/i>. At one point, a violin plays a romantic line, while another
\ninstrument plinks discordantly in the background, as if mocking it. This is followed by a tumult of
\npatriotic music, blaring furiously away, finally coming to a climax. Immediately after the climax is a break where the
\naudience laughs nervously in the recording that I listened to. It is a spectacular and occasionally
\noverwhelming work. Ives wanted “to
\nstrengthen and give more muscle to the ear, brain, heart, limbs and feat<\/b>!” [Ives’ emphasis] (Cowell p. 10) His work is strong and can and should
\nbe enjoyed despite his troubling politics.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Taking him on! Celeste Hutchins Proseminar 10 September 2003 Postmodernist Ives Kramer is correct in concluding that Ives is not a “pre-postmodernist.” Although Ives aesthetic is clearly very forward thinking, his intentions are not and he borders on being a romantic. Kramer’s article starts with a definition of postmodernism “as a recurrent movement within … Continue reading <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[203,76,170],"class_list":["post-1721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorised","tag-academic","tag-celesteh","tag-wesleyan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1721","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1721"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1721\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3973,"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1721\/revisions\/3973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1721"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1721"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.celesteh.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1721"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}