"wrong" side of the Ives issue

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In the ongoing discussion of Ives between Daniel Sterns and Johnny
Reinhardt, let me add my two "cents" worth...

Johnny R., you're going to kill me, but D. Sterns does have an interesting
point when he states that Ives intonational tuning might involve
"individual instances" and not an "overall paradigm."

In my earlier studies of Charles Ives, which I admit were a while ago and
not certainly anywhere near as rigorous as yours are presently, Johnny R.,
I do recall reading about these Ives tuning issues.

However, nowhere did Ives state that he was developing an "overall
paradigm" or overall tuning system different from 12-tET. Wouldn't one
think that he would have more to say on an issue of such great importance
as developing an entirely different system from the norm?? Just something
to think about.

So, in other words, is Ives concerned about "specific instances" to improve
his intonation or is he going for the "overall?" Frankly, I'm a bit
unconvinced that Ives was trying to revolutionize overall tuning...

We need more evidence. Shoot me now, Johnny!

Joe Pehrson

[P.S. Congrats to Joe Monzo for trying to get to the bottom of some of the
Ives scales in his most recent posts!]

Joe, there is an "acoustic plan" announced by Ives and there is a lifetime of
Charles Ives listening to unusual musical intervals. Once again, let me
state that Ives was a polymicrotonalist, so no one tuning is always active.

Ives scholar and former Society President, J. Peter Burkholder, wrote an
essay emphasizing that there are 4 distinct styles for Ives, one of which is
experimental. These "experimental" works have been discussed specifically on
the list, and it is to these particular works that Ives's prose on tuning
applies.

There cannot, however, be a wishy-washing tuning model for Ives. Peter
Yates's interpretation begins to make more sense, wherein Ives evolved out of
12TET in more ways than simply quartertones and eighthtones.

Why shouldn't Ives demand more of his music than anyone else could expect?
Composers do indeed need to "hear" the notes that they are writing down. By
taking Ives at his word - and realizing it in performance - a new dimension
opens up. It is as if there are new dynamics rules, new ways for musical
tones to rub up against each other, new structures to focus on. What were
dissonances on the piano are transformed by subtle tuning adjustments
permitting now new, rich colors.

Ives was a bright man who regularly multi-tasked many things. Why wouldn't
he keep in his mind that people could barely understand him as it was? It is
completely unrealistic for Ives to do any more than he had to indicate his
tuning preferences.

I do agree with Dan that it should be done on a case by case basis. And of
course, beginning with the so-called experimental pieces, newly recorded.

Johnny Reinhard
AFMM

[Johnny Reinhard:]
> There cannot, however, be a wishy-washing tuning model for Ives.

Not to be any more of a pain in the a-- than I already am, but I have
to ask why not? If the confident navigation of ambiguity and wide
ranging inclusiveness are hallmarks of Ives; rigor is not... and while
"wishy-washing" wouldn't be what I'd call his "tuning model" either,
exactly (and rigorously) this, or exactly (and rigorously) that,
doesn't seem to me to be the case either... I mean in the letter you
posted about Babitz and Dahl's editing of the Third Violin Sonata he
wrote (through Harmony):

"it was mainly due to some acoustical plan--which he had in mind or
was working out or trying to in those days"

So I'm curious why you say, "there cannot."

>It is completely unrealistic for Ives to do any more than he had to
indicate his tuning preferences.

Again, I feel as though I have to ask why (is it completely
unrealistic)? It is certainly not completely unrealistic to piece
together an extended Pythagorean tuning scenario, but his own words
say that "which he had in mind or was working out or trying to" (etc.,
etc.). And this hardly seems (to me anyway) the sturdy stuff of a
preferential tuning model, or (here in the present) the basis for
building an unassailable analytical conviction... However, when you
write stuff like: "a new dimension opens up. It is as if there are
new dynamics rules, new ways for musical tones to rub up against each
other, new structures to focus on. What were dissonances on the piano
are transformed by subtle tuning adjustments permitting now new, rich
colors." I'm 100% with you (for whatever that's worth), and frothing
at the ear to hear it.

Dan