WILL HAVE TO BE "CLOSE ENOUGH" FOR NOW]
The Housatonic at Kent (Conn.) [photo by the Housatonic Valley Association]
"The Housatonic at Stockbridge [1914] was inspired by a Sunday morning walk that Mrs. Ives and I took near Stockbridge [Mass.], the summer after we were married [1908]. We walked in the meadows along the river, and heard the distant singing from the church across the river. The mist had not entirely left the river bed, and the colors, the running water, the banks and elm trees were something that one would always remember. Robert Underwood Johnson, in his poem The Housatonic at Stockbridge, paints the scene beautifully."
-- Ives, Memos, on no. 3 of his Three Places in New England
Eastman-Rochester Orchestra, Howard Hanson, cond. Mercury, rec. 1957
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, David Zinman, cond. Argo, recorded 1994
[Note: Eventually I'll say a bit about these differently terrific performances, Hanson's pulsing with life, Zinman's exploding with musical perception.]
OR, AS AN "ART SONG" -- WITHOUT ORCHESTRA, BUT
WITH ROBERT UNDERWOOD JOHNSON'S WORDS (1921)
Contented river! In thy dreamy realm
the cloudy willow and the plumy elm:
thou beautiful! From ev'ry dreamy hill
what eye but wanders with thee at thy will.
Contented river! And yet over-shy
to mask thy beauty from the eager eye;
hast thou a thought to hide from field and town?
In some deep current of the sunlit brown.
Ah! there's a restive ripple,
and the swift red leaves
September's firstlings faster drift.
Wouldst thou away, dear stream?
Come, whisper near!
I also of much resting have a fear:
Let me tomorrow thy companion be,
by fall and shallow to the adventurous sea!
-- text by R.U.J. ("by permission," the score tells us)
Jan DeGaetani (ms); Gilbert Kalish, piano. Nonesuch, released 1976
Gerald Finley (bs-b); Julius Drake, piano. Hyperion, recorded 2004
[Note: Wow! Not that they'll top these, but we're going to hear a couple more performances of the song which I think will add to our picture of it.]
Then again, not necessarily without orchestra --
Michael Tilson Thomas incorporated the text (sung chorally!) in his 1999 live-performance recording of Three Places in New England.
San Francisco Symphony Chorus and Orchestra, MTT, cond. RCA, 1999
AS WE KNOW, MEMORIES MATTER -- A LOT -- IN IVES'S MUSIC
In that spirit, here are parts of two Ives songs we've already heard, though not in these performances (which we will be hearing in full). Are there any you like especially -- or maybe not so much?
