Reviews

The Charles Ives Songbook
February 16, 2025
Christ & St. Luke's Episcopal Church
Review by John Campbell

The twelfth Annual Allen Shaffer Concert at Christ and St. Luke's focused on the "Charles Ives Songbook" and was a unique blend of audience participation and a terrific chamber music program of music by Ives. Charles Ives was born October 20, 1874 in Danbury, Connecticut and died in 1954 when I was twelve years old. Late in his life (1947) he received the Pulitzer Prize for his Third Symphony (composed 1904-1911). I discovered his music on LP recordings in the early 1960s and found what he did with familiar hymns delightful. I was intrigued by his clever use of discords, polyrhythms and polytonality and I still am. When I had to choose from several programs on this Sunday afternoon that I would like to attend, Ives and Steve Coxe won.

The lavishly laid out, comprehensive program booklet included the texts of the hymns and songs he used in the compositions that followed. With organ accompaniment the audience was invited to sing the hymns that were followed by Ives' music that incorporated the tunes.

Ives' Variations on America (1891) had us singing "My country tis of thee sweet land of liberty ..." accompanied by Norman Elton on organ. Mr. Elton is organist and Assistant Director of Music at Williamsburg Presbyterian Church and has studied with Thomas Marshall and Dr. Allen Shaffer and has a full-time career of note. The organ rocked-out loud and clear but with woven-in gentle variations by contrast. There was a comical send-up, thin bell tones and grand muscular passages, all brilliantly articulated by Mr. Elton.

The hymn Jesus Lover of My Soul is found in "The Alcotts", from Sonata No. 2 for Piano "Concord, Mass., 1840-1860" (1920) played by Stephen Coxe. Referred to as the "Concord Sonata", it offers Ives' impressions of the personality and philosophical attitudes of its subject. It had a gentle, tuneful opening with occasional "wrong notes" but with Beethoven's 5th Symphony woven in. He returns to the hymn tune and eventually a missionary chant, Go Labor On, that was sung twice by the audience and was new to me. There was grandeur in a passionate section, only to return to a gentle pastoral ending. In Ives' Essays Before a Sonata, he wrote "And there sits the old spinet piano Sophia Thoreau gave to the Alcott children on which Beth played the old Scotch airs and played the [Beethoven] Fifth Symphony." The music captured Ives' meditation on the calm of Concord's streets and the "trials and happiness of the family."

Bass-baritone Hunter Enoch sang Three Short Songs. I. Maple Leaves (1920), a song of falling leaves that we hear in the piano and a sizzle in the depth of the voice as the last leaves slip away "Like coins between a dying miser's fingers." II. Serenity (1919) is a deep meditation resting in the peace of Jesus' love. III. At the River (1916) is Ives' setting of a hymn by Reverend Robert Lowery with unexpected rhythms, altered chords and irreverent cadences that seems unwillingly to accept the invitation to gather at the river. The listener is left to create an ending of their own.

After applause and a brief interval we sang There is a fountain filled with blood, an 18th century hymn by William Cowper. Then we were treated to Mr. Enoch singing General William Booth Enters Into Heaven (1914). Booth was the first commander of the Salvation Army. The text is by Vachel Lindsay from 1912. In the song he leads an army of drunks, lepers and all sorts of downtrodden folks marching into heaven greeted by Jesus with outreached hands. In a huge musical canvas the singer creates the energetic frenzy of a religious revival. The hymn tune "Are you washed in the blood of the lamb?" is inserted at various places in the narrative. Each repeat offered a unique, new experience.

I grew-up with this hymn and found the singer's journey through this text emotionally gripping. The bloody sacrifice of my religion never convinced me personally that it was real. Ives' music, clearly delivered by Mr. Enoch, triggered my memory of the whole emotional endeavor of such evangelism. Perhaps for a younger generation, superhero movies have replaced the fire and brimstone of this brash, musical experience. Dr Coxe's piano was essential to this overwhelming impact and the singer's journey through the text captured our full attention. The array of emotions from line-to-line, expressed in Enoch's face and voice enthralled. Standing outside the narrative, I was caught and brought back in as he sang "are you washed in the blood?" Ives' music clearly delivered by Mr. Enoch, this time held all my skepticism of the whole emotional endeavor of such evangelism. Kudos to Stephen Coxe and to Hunter Enoch for collaborating for a second time this season and giving us the chance to hear this exceptional voice locally. https://hunterenoch.com/

After intermission, the New Commonwealth Quartet played String Quartet No. 1 "From the Salvation Army" or "From a Revival Service" (1869), written when Ives was in his early twenties and a student of a German-trained, musically conservative teacher at Yale University. The first movement, Chorale, after we sang From Greenland's Icy Mountain (a missionary hymn) and All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name, dominates the majestic unfolding fugue. The lively second movement, Prelude, followed our singing Beulah Land and Shining Shore and a bit of the melody of Bringing in the Sheaves was thrown into the dancing joy here. It ended abruptly.

The third movement, Offertory, had us singing Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. The meditative, lyrical third movement had a waltz-like section of the hymn with pizzicato accompaniment with great energy, contrasting with a calming conclusion. Before Movement IV Postlude we sang Stand up, stand up for Jesus. The finale begins in a lively fashion quoting the hymns All Hail the Power of Jesus' Name and Stand Up for Jesus. The contrasting lyrical section again quotes Shining Shore, and for the movement's climax, Ives superimposes Shining Shore on "Stand up for Jesus," each in a different meter creating chaos beloved by Ives' fans and "probably terrifying the congregation before the triumphant, placating conclusion" to quote Herbert Glass' program notes. It was a great conclusion to a satisfying evening of Ives.

Formed in 2015, the New Commonwealth Quartet is made up of Virginia Symphony Orchestra members: violinists Elizabeth Coulter Vonderheide & Jonathan Richards; viola, Matthew Umlauf; cello, Elizabeth Meszaros. The quartet is an in-demand local ensemble and has also recorded with Bruce Hornsby.

The concert was all under the watchful eye of Christ and St. Luke's music director Kevin Kwan and his close collaboration with Allen Shaffer and Stephen Coxe. The reception at the rear of the sanctuary featured eight kinds of delicious, homemade cookies and beverages to add to the sweetness of this celebration of American music.