Three Places in New England - History

History

Three Places in New England was composed between 1903 and 1929. The set was completed in 1914, but was later revised for performance in 1929. The second piece, Putnam’s Camp, Redding, Connecticut was created from two short theater orchestra pieces composed by Ives in 1903. These pieces, "Country Band" March and Overture & March: "1776", were completed in 1904. Lyman Brewster, Ives' uncle, had asked him to compose the pieces for his play Major John Andre which was never performed due to Brewster's untimely death. In the early fall of 1912, Ives began tinkering with these compositions again. The satisfaction that Ives derived from working on the Fourth of July (the third movement of his Holiday Symphony), in which he used the trio section of 1776, may have been the catalyst for inspiring him to reuse these lost songs and create a longer piece. By October, 1912, Ives had a complete ink score-sketch of Putnam's Camp. The final version of the piece clearly resembles its source materials, but many of the complex musical jokes that littered the originals had been replaced with simpler alternatives.

The Housatonic at Stockbridge, the third piece in the set, was composed in 1911 along with the opening piece, The "St.-Gaudens" in Boston Common (Col. Shaw and his Colored Regiment). By 1912, after finishing Putnam's Camp, Ives had settled on the form of a three-movement orchestral set, and had written the majority of it.

In 1929, Nicolas Slonimsky, then the conductor of the Boston Chamber Orchestra, contacted Ives about the possibility of performing Three Places. Slonimsky had been urged by American composer Henry Cowell, Ives' contemporary, to perform an Ives piece for some time, and Three Places caught his attention.

The thorough reworking required to transform Three Places from an orchestral score to one that could be performed by a much smaller chamber orchestra renewed Ives' interest in the piece. Slonimsky required that the piece be re-scored for: 1 flute, 1 oboe, 1 English horn, 1 clarinet, 1 bassoon, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, 1 trombone, 1 percussionist, 1 piano, 7 violins, 2 violas, 2 celli and 1 bass – a much smaller orchestra than the original. Ives was glad to have his piece played, but his comments on the re-scoring include, on the full score of The Housatonic at Stockbridge, "piano may be used for Bassoons throughout… a poor substitute…".

Three Places was first performed on February 16, 1930 by Slonimsky before the American Committee of the International Society for Contemporary Music, in New York City. Although the piece had only been rehearsed once, the Committee was sufficiently impressed to recommend the work to the International Committee who surprisingly turned it down for performance at their festival. The first public performance was scheduled for 10 January 1931. Ives himself attended – in fact, he was funding the concert himself! The performance received mild applause and Ives congratulated the performers backstage – "Just like a town meeting – every man for himself. Wonderful how it came out!"

After the mild success of the first performance, Slonimsky and Ives were inspired to take Three Places abroad: Ives is one of the first American composers to have been played outside America. Slonimsky performed Three Places in Paris on June 6, at a concert he described as "absolutely extraordinary" because of the attendance of many important composers and critics of the time. Their first experience of Ives left them impressed: Ives’ music was not just interesting because it was composed by an American, it also fascinated them because the music described America. Although the listeners did not understand all the cultural references, Ives was calling attention to American ideals, issues, experiences and perspectives. For instance, in The St. Gaudens', Ives paraphrases ragtime, slave plantation songs such as Old Black Joe and even patriotic American Civil War tunes such as Marching through Georgia. The combination of such songs elicits images of the fight for freedom in America. International recognition solidified the image of Ives as an American composer, especially strengthened by his use of borrowing from typically American sounding pieces.

Three Places in New England became the first of Ives' compositions to be commercially published. Slonimsky was in touch with C. C. Birchard (a publisher from Boston) on Ives’ behalf and, by 1935, the two had negotiated a deal. Ives and Slonimsky both painstakingly checked the score through, note by note, to make sure the engravings were correct. In 1935, Ives held a copy of his first work in his hands. Ives requested that the binding bear his name in as small a font as possible, so as to not appear egotistical.

For many years, very little interest in performance of Three Places was aroused by its publication. Following the curtailment of Slonimsky's conducting career, the piece lay dormant until 1948, when Richard Burgin programmed Three Places on a Boston Symphony Orchestra concert. The current practice of performing Ives' chamber scores as full orchestral pieces was thus established.

In the 1970s, interest in Three Places in New England was piqued once again. This time it was regarding the differences between the 1914 scoring, much of which was lost, and the 1929 score, which had been rewritten for Slonimsky’s chamber orchestra. Extensive research was undertaken by James Sinclair at Yale University, and it was concluded that the 1914 version could not be reproduced in its entirety, as only 35% of the second movement survived Ives' cutting for the 1929 version. Sinclair created what is currently believed to be the closest replication of the 1914 score for full orchestra by extrapolating Ives' scraps, sketches and notes.