American Symphony Recordings

Am I the only person in the world who thinks that Bernstein's 3rd [in its original rather than revised version]  "Kaddish" is the finest American symphony? I have never heard anyone have a good word to say about it, but I have found it a truly spiritual experience - even though I am not an adherent of the Jewish faith. It was written partly as a response to the assassination of JFK and - for me - was one of those impulse buys in W H Smith [remember those good old days when they used to sell classical records?] which proved most felicitous. 

Beethoven was selling gold dust, Bernstein was selling coal dust.

(and yes, that should have been 'world peace').

And whilst on the subject of American jokes, not many coming into bat for Charles Ives!

Has there ever really been a great symphony written by an American. It is difficult to find one American symphony that is, even moderately represented in the catalogue. This from a land that has been at the forefront of recorded music. You can find numerous recordings of even the lesser symphonies of Shostakovich. British orchestras fall over themselves to record the symphonies of Elgar and Vaugham Williams. If an American symphony was world class you could 'bet your bottom dollar' that the Americans would let us know. They are pretty quiet on the recording front. That tells you all you need to know about American symphonies.

Ives' Fourth not monumental enough for you, parla?

Maybe he's not that important if you define "important" as "influentual". He was pretty much a solitary figure whose music was way too "far out" to have a deciding influence on a younger generation of composers.

Still, I did a thesis on the 4th for my composers' class in conservatoy - and the more you dig in this fabulously complex score, the more you discover and admire. Same goes for the Concord Sonata. Both are pieces that are momumental on a scale that sometimes doesn't look "human" anymore.

And it's not only the 4th that makes Ives (to me) the greatest American symphonist. The 3rd is a lovely piece on a far more intimate scale, and the 1st and 2nd are well-crafted and original pieces, even if they show the influence of Brahms.

The Holidays Symphony comes closest to the 4th in terms of complexity and modernity, but to me the mystical content of the 4th makes it a "deeper" experience.

The joke would wear thin... if his music were only that.

In fact, the famous "clashes" that for many people are Ives' trademark don't occur THAT often in his music. In the 4th, only segments of the 2nd movement and a small part of the finale sound like you described.

If you take the Holiday's Symphony, one of his greatest works (longer even than the 4th), most of the music consists of slowly moving panes of strange, mystical chords, hardly exuberant. Only occasionally there are the polytonal, polyrhytmic outbursts - but of course people remember those most clearly. Same goes for "3 Places in New England".

In the 3rd, they're completely absent - and this piece may be a good antidote for people who only associate Ives with discordant noise.