usic by
an American. It reflects the musical innovations of its creator,
featuring revolutionary atmospheric effects, unprecedented atonal
musical syntax, and surprising technical approaches to playing the
piano, such as pressing down on over 10 notes simultaneously using a
flat piece of wood.

What a mischievious creative genius!

And yet, despite the musically innovative nature of these works, from a
thematic standpoint, they are strictly 19th century. Ives, like
American band-composer Sousa, consciously infused patriotic or
"blue-blood" themes into his pieces. In the "Concord," he attempted to
project, within the music, the 19th century philosophical ideas of the
American Transcendentalists, who obviously had a great impact on his
world-view.

Thus, while other atonal composers such as Schoenberg or Berg attempted
to infuse their music with "20th century" themes of hostility, violence
and estrangement within their atonal music, the atonal music of Ives
is, from a thematic standpoint, really quite "tonal."

Ives wrote the following essays as a (very big) set of program notes to
accompany his second piano sonata. Here, he puts forth his elaborate
theory of music and what it represents, and discusses Transcendental
philosophy and its relation to music. The essays explain Ives' own
philosophy of and understanding of music and art. They also serve as
an analysis of music itself as an artform, and provide a critical
explanation of the "Concord" and the role that the philosophies of
Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau and the Alcotts play in forming its
thematic structure.

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"ESSAYS BEFORE A SONATA," BY CHARLES IVES

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INTRODUCTORY FOOTNOTE BY CHARLES IVES

"These prefatory essays were written by the composer for those who
can't stand his music--and the music for those who can't stand his
essays; to those who can't stand either, the whole is respectfully
dedicated."

INTRODUCTION

The following pages were written primarily as a preface or reason for
the [writer's] second Pianoforte Sonata--"Concord, Mass., 1845,"--a
group of four pieces, called a sonata for want of a more exact name, as
the form, perhaps substance, does not justify it. The music and
prefaces were intended to be printed together, but as it was found that
this would make a cumbersome volume they are separate. The