Catalog

Love is what fascinates poets at all times and Broadway lyricists are often poets extra-ordinaire. Oscar Hammerstein, Stephen Sondheim, Cole Porter and so many others help us with our enjoyment of life and compel us to sing. The songs on this disc include ones we all know and some we may have heard and a few that are recent and obscure enough to be a pleasure to discover. But mostly, each of these songs is a work of art and beautifully sung by Jean Danton. Danton's artistry has led to acclaimed performances through the United States and Europe in opera, oratorio, recitals, and as a soloist with symphony orchestras. She is a favorite soloist for musical theatre and pops concerts appearing with the Boston Pops Orchestra and New England Light Opera among others and her versatility extends to jazz as well. She has several recordings on Albany Records and Newport Classics. Her television credits include documentaries for PBS and Lifetime. Collaborating with Ms. Danton are pianist Doug Hammer and drummer Steve Chaggaris.

We lost one of the great American composers in June of 2005 when David Diamond passed away. However, we have been fortunate to have heard his Symphonies, chamber works and complete String Quartets (TROY504, 540, 613 and 727) on record over the years, yet this is the first CD devoted entirely to his songs, though he wrote nearly 100 of them. The songs range in emotion from the sweetly lyrical and wistfully elegiac to the humorously satirical and ironic, from plaintive innocence to homespun world-weariness, from mysterious enigma to heart-rending poignancy, from compassion with souls in torment to the need for humans to connect with others even though the connection may be painful, and from deceptive quasi-simplicity to unearthly and nearly orchestral passion and power. All but one are in English and encompass the full poetic gamut of human emotion and experience. Soprano Helene Williams and pianist Leonard Lehrman have collaborated on performances in Amsterdam, Paris, Germany, the United States, as well as song recitals on CD. This, their first Albany release, is a wonderful memorial to an important American composer.

Soprano Rebecca Wascoe Hays is an avid promoter of contemporary American composers and her enthusiasm is evident in this recording of music by the esteemed composer Libby Larsen. Wascoe Hays has chosen two major works (The Magdalene and De Toda La Eternidad) interspersed with two arias from Larsen's operas and two songs. The Magdalene is a setting of Chapter 33 verses 1-12, 14-18 and 30-35 from the Pistis Sophia, a Gnostic text that comes from the third century. De Toda La Eternidad is a song cycle sung by a lover caught in an agonizing suspension of time — a time in which the lover perceives everything from beginning to end, even before the affair begins. Ms. Wascoe Hays has twice been a winner of the Gerda Lissner Foundation Award and has been recognized as a finalist or semi-finalist in many international competitions. She is on the faculties of Texas Tech University and Music in the Marche. Her collaborator, pianist Jeffrey Peterson, has appeared in recitals and master classes on five continents. His concert and recital appearances have taken him around the world.

In his second CD recording, bass-baritone Oral Moses offers art songs and spiritual arrangements by African-American composers and arrangers whose work spans the 20th century and spills over into the 21st century. Mr. Moses, a South Carolina native, began his singing career as a member of the United States Seventh Army Soldiers Chorus in Heidelberg, Germany and a member of the famed Fisk Jubilee Singers while attending Fisk University following his military career. Upon completion of his undergraduate studies he was awarded a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship which provided him the opportunity to return to Europe for further study in vocal performance and opera. Upon his return to the United States, he attended the University of Michigan where he earned a Masters of Music and Doctorate of Musical Arts Degree in vocal performance and opera. He is the co-author of Feel the Spirit: Studies in 19th Century Afro-American Music. He is currently Professor of Voice and Music Literature at Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia.

The artists on this disc write: "Through the ages, they have played recitals, studied in conservatories, written symphonies, concerti, chamber music, operas and piano works. Their music has been performed and recorded by the world's most prestigious orchestras, chamber ensembles, vocalists and instrumentalists. Although frequently neglected, art songs have consistently appeared in the output of women composers. From the parlor songs of Amy Beach to the jazzy accompaniments and lush tunes of Margaret Bonds, American and African-American women have created well-written and interesting compositions and made exciting contributions to the art of song repertoire. This CD is a compendium of these unsung (and in some instances unpublished) art songs. Some are romantic and rapturous, others folksy and frilly, yet all are replete with charm and dignity and worthy to be heard."

Gena Branscombe was a major figure in song writing from the turn of the century through the 1930s, the period when the solo recital was a viable venue for the professional singer. Gena grew up immersed from an early age in the musical life in the small Canadian town of Picton, Ontario. She studied with local teachers, finished high school with honors at 15, and then went to Chicago where she enrolled in the Chicago Musical College as a scholarship student of Rudolph Ganz. Basically on her own from age 16 onwards, she taught piano students and accompanied singers to supplement her income. In 1901, she joined the Musical College as a piano teacher. In 1907, she moved to Walla Walla, Washington, to establish the music department and teach at Whitman College. In 1909-1910, she studied in Berlin with Ganz and Englebert Humperdinck. She returned to America in 1910 and married and then settled in New York City where she and her husband had four daughters. She then moved to Mountain Lakes, New Jersey, where she began to participate in local choruses. She wrote much choral music and succeeded Mrs. H.H.A. Beach as the second president of the Society of American Women Composers. The 1930s marked the creation of the Branscombe Choral, a women's chorus. The chorus was finally disbanded in 1954, when Gena was 73 years old. She spent the rest of her life traveling with her daughters and composing. Her first songs were published in Chicago in the 1890s, while she was still a student. Her last song was published in 1957. Her greatest activity as a published song composer was between 1906 and 1922, after which her attention turned to choral works.

Born in New York City, Alan Seidler studied at The Juilliard School, but after leaving Juilliard, his career took a left turn and he soon became one of the pioneers of the Blues and Ragtime revival of the 1970s. The most successful of his recordings from this era was The Duke of Ook, which became and still remains a cult classic. In the late 1980s he returned to composition and in the past decade, he has focused primarily on vocal and choral works.

Composer Allan Blank has written two song cycles for voice and piano with double bass, both of which are given world premiere recordings on this disc. One cycle uses poetry from the Holocaust and the second is based on poetry by Jane Kenyon. Allen Blank is Professor Emeritus at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. Many of his more than 300 compositions have been published and recorded. Three of the performers are affiliated with West Virginia University (Catharine Thieme, mezzo-soprano, Robert Thieme, piano, Andrew Kohn, double bass). Soprano Jennifer Miller is an active performer in the Pittsburgh area and pianist Robert Frankenberry is a member of New York's Phoenix Players.

Dreams, American dreams in particular, are basic to our lives. Whether it is the desire to write the perfect love song to use as a serenade or the need to break away from the everyday, humdrum world and escape into the land of rhythm, these songs make those dreams immediate and very real. Every song in this collection speaks to the heart, as well as to the mind, of the singer and the listener. American in content and context, American voices sing these songs best. Vocal music written by young American composers is coming into its own here at the end of this century and more singers are including songs by American songwriters than ever before in their recitals and recordings. Many new works are being commissioned by singers every year. In this recording Jean Danton presents an overview of the heart of American song writing for the last 150 years. Beautiful Dreamer, for example, has the same poignant soul as All the Things You Are. That particular Kern song is as complex, musically, as anything by Charles Ives. Gershwin's and Carpenter's musicianship is the equal of Copland's. Romberg and Ganz, for all their European background, made their American music as truly native in appeal as Bernstein or Joplin. Carl Davis' song seems to sum up the whole spectrum of song writing on its own terms. There is much to love in this music; all songs, sad, sweet, melancholy or raucous, are about love and about dreams. Heart Songs really are American Dreams.

The 11 works on this compact disc represent four generations of American composers and a compositional time span of eight decades. In the ensemble repertoire for voice and flute, only Corigliano's Three Irish Folksong Settings and Copland's As It Fell Upon a Day enjoy wide recognition; the remaining works are relatively unknown and deserving of a broader audience. The artists comment: "In selecting music for this disc we sought works that define skillful text setting and showcase contrasting compositional styles. Just as American "character" defies definition because of its rich cultural blend, the American musical "style" comprises myriad voices--each distinct in its conviction." Five of these compositions are world premiere recordings Ñ Martin Amlin's Two Songs on Poems of Anne Fessenden; Kenneth Gaburo's Cantilena One for solo soprano; Braxton Blake's Three Songs on Poems by Marianne Moore; Ralph Shapey's Lullaby; Scott Gendel's Patterns; and Kurt Stallmann's Lumina II for solo flute.

From Billings to Bolcom - the subtitle of this recording dedicated to the American art song is a compilation of the best American has to offer from our musical beginnings to today. "Some of our best American composers have not been prolific songwriters," says Paul Sperry. "I think William Schuman's Orpheus with His Lute has everything a song needs: it is simple, moving and beautiful. But it is a single song, written for a proposed production of Henry VIII and has no companion pieces. Elliott Carter's three settings of Robert Frost constitute almost half of the solo songs he wrote, and Elie Siegmeister's arrangement of William Billings is the only solo Billings song I have seen. That is why I have compiled this American Sampler - to be able to record songs I love without having to worry about assembling a group by each composer. I have simply picked 31 of my favorite songs and put them together the way I would in a recital: organized to show each one to greatest advantage. I have deliberately not grouped the songs by composer, period or style, except for John Musto's little cycle, Shadow of the Blue: I kept it together because it is so powerful as an entity." Paul Sperry is recognized as one of today's outstanding interpreters of American music. Although he is equally at home in a repertoire that extends from Monteverdi opera and the Bach Passions to Britten's War Requiem and hundreds of songs in more than a dozen languages, he brings to American music a conviction and an enthusiasm that has brought it to life for countless listeners.

Baritone Stephen Swanson and pianist/composer David Gompper perform a program of songs about animals, including the world premiere recording of The Animals by David Gompper, which is a cycle of nine songs based on poetry by Marvin Bell. Ravel's Histoires naturelles is based on prose poems by Jules Renard. Ravel experimented with new methods of setting text in this elegant song cycle. Reger's songs were based on nursery rhymes and dedicated to his children. The selections from The Bestiary of Flanders and Swann include some of the most popular of this team's collaboration. Beautifully sung by Stephen Swanson, a professor of voice at the University of Iowa, these bestiaries offer animal songs in English, French and German.

With this 2-CD recording, the complete oeuvre of Arnold Rosner's songs is now available on compact disc. The texts range widely and their sources range from the gospel according to St. Luke and the Jewish Aramaic liturgy to Rosner's friends poems. The predominant language is English, but there are songs in Aramaic, French, German and Finnish as well. Born in 1945, Arnold Rosner attended New York University where he majored in mathematics and music. He formally undertook music composition study at the State University of New York at Buffalo, receiving the first Ph.D. in music awarded by that institution. He exemplifies the composite career of a diversely talented musician. He has taught at several colleges, was music director at WNYU and assistant music director of WNYC and is a capable conductor and pianist. He is the recipient of seven awards from ASCAP and a five-time recipient of Meet the Composer grants.

Marilyn Taylor writes: "My voice sat down in this music. It kicked its shoes off and felt cold bare earth and said 'this is home.' The events leading to the creation of this disc took place over many years. A motivating factor in producing it was bringing the songs of Charles Vardell to light, as well as other unrecorded works of composers either born, or living in North Carolina. Synchronicity has proven that a link exists between myself and each group of songs, sometimes becoming obvious only after the fact. Moving to Winston-Salem in 1992 to teach at the North Carolina School of the Arts was made easier because the terrain and homes reminded me of Louisville, Kentucky, my birthplace. Here I discovered I share with Frazelle and Vardell a love of land and hills and an appreciation of rural life and music, instilled in me by childhood visits to relatives in 'the country' and long jaunts in the woods there. The songs of Robert Ward do not evoke these types of images; however, a connection between Millay (from whom the text is taken) and myself exists in the passion for a younger man, which in my case became a marriage and a musical collaboration lasting fifteen years."

Tenor Jos Milton comments that "This program is an artistic tribute to the human connection to the earth. I searched for planet-centered texts that bring focus to the grandeur of our world, transmitted through contemporary art song." Composers include Robert Owens (1925-2017); Ned Rorem (b. 1923); Zachary Wadsworth (b. 1983); Srul Irving Glick (1934-2002); and Libby Larsen (b. 1950). Jos Milton maintains a robust performance schedule, spanning a vast array of repertoire and musical styles. A graduate of Trinity University, the University of Massachusetts, and the Peabody Institute, Milton is on the faculty at the University of Mississippi. His collaborator, pianist Melinda Coffey Armstead has performed as recitalist and chamber musician in the U.S., Canada, England, France, Israel, and Japan.

By the time of the great emergence of the recording industry in the 1930's, John Alden Carpenter's exquisite songs, which had enjoyed such widespread acclaim in the 1910's and 1920's, had begun to lose favor. Even to this day, very few of these songs, most of which date from the early 1910's, have found their way into the recording studio. All the more reason, then, to welcome this recording by Robert Osborne and Dennis Helmrich of nearly all of Carpenter's mature songs. This includes some, mostly from Carpenter's later years, that the composer never even published. (Only someone as unsparingly scrupulous as Carpenter would think twice about bringing out the likes of "Spring Joys," "Midnight Nan," or "The Hermit Club.") Carpenter's choice of texts - from Wilde and Yeats to Tagore and Li Po, from Langston Hughes and James Agee to a few minor poets now forgotten, but still contemporaries of quality - reveals an astonishing sensitivity toward new poetic trends. (It helped that he lived in the Chicago of Harriet Moore's Poetry and Margaret Anderson's Little Review.) Complimenting this refined literary sensibility one finds a highly sophisticated command of harmony and counterpoint, though the music always serves, never overwhelms the poetic idea, somewhat in the tradition of Debussy, whose songs clearly made a deep impression. For all their delicacy, many of Carpenter's songs show a pronounced and rather melancholy preoccupation with loneliness and death, but faced with extraordinary calm and restraint. Even the love songs and humorous songs have a certain wistfulness, a bittersweet quality that is pure Carpenter. Complete texts.

Jacob Avshalomov was born in Tsingtao, China in 1919. He studied music first with his father, Aaron Avshalomov, and then Ernst Toch, Bernard Rogers, Aaron Copland and at Reed College and the Eastman School. He has taught at Columbia University and summers at Tanglewood and Aspen. From 1954 to 1994, he was conductor of the Portland Youth Symphony where he conducted among other works, the U.S. premieres of Tippett's The Child of Our Time and Roger Sessions' Divertimento. About the music on this disc, Mr. Avshalomov writes: "I'm with William Byrd, when he proclaimed, "Since synging is so good a thynge I wish all men would learne to synge.' The human voice is the ultimate musical instrument. I still believe this even after having reveled for 40 years as conductor of the Portland Youth Symphony. So it was no surprise to me, when I stepped down from my podium to concentrate on composing that as I surveyed my lifetime list of works, I realized over half of them were either vocal or choral. This, of course reflects an abiding interest in poetry and devotional literature of various persuasions. The songs presented in this recording were composed over a 40-year period, which began a decade before I became a conductor. Almost all the songs were composed for mezzo-soprano."

The works on this CD present a collection of songs that reflect the richness and sophistication of the American song tradition from the 19th century up through the end of the 20th century. The first half of this recording includes Battle Pieces, a song cycle written by Warren Michel Swenson; the second half contains 11 19th century songs by European and African American composers. All the works on this CD interact with two central themes: the Civil War era and the interconnections between the Black and White culture in America. In his song cycle, Swenson, a contemporary American composer, sets Herman Melville's Civil War poems, Battle Pieces and Aspects of the War. Also included on the disc are 19th century songs that come out of the minstrel and parlor song tradition. With easily available published sheet music, the dissemination of popular music in the 19th century reached a large audience that both reflected and helped shape values of that time. Considered all together, this collection presents two views, a century apart, of how music can articulate the culture and themes surrounding the Civil War era.

Sheila Silver has written in a wide range of mediums, from solo instrumental to large orchestral works, from opera to feature film scores. She is the recipient of numerous awards and commissions, including an American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters Composer Award, the Rome Prize, and the Prix de Paris, among many others. She is Professor Emeritas of Music at Stony Brook University. This recording features song cycles including Beauty Intolerable, based on the poetry of Edna St. Vincent Millay, and a cycle using fragments of texts from Sappho, along with a nocturne for solo piano. The stellar cast of performers includes Lucy Fitz Gibbon, Dawn Upshaw, Gilbert Kalish, Ryan McCullough, Stephanie Blythe, Kayo Iwama, Sidney Outlaw, Warren Jones, Deanne Meek, Christopher Cooley, Risa Renae Harman, and Timothy Long.

Lori Laitman is an award-winning composer whose art songs are performed widely in the United States and abroad. The Journal of Singing calls Laitman “one of the finest art song composers on the scene today… who deservedly stands shoulder to shoulder with Ned Rorem for her uncommon sensitivity to text, her loving attention to the human voice and its capabilities, and her extraordinary palette of musical colors and gestures.” A graduate magna cum laude from Yale, she studied under Jonathan Kramer and Frank Lewin, and concentrated initially on flute performance and theatre and film scores. Her music has been performed all over the United States, particularly at Merkin Hall and Alice Tully Hall in New York, and at the Kennedy Center and the Library of Congress in Washington. Albany has previously issued two highly-acclaimed CDs of her songs, Mystery (TROY393) and Dreaming (TROY570). Of this new release, she says, “The songs on my third CD are compositions in partnership with contemporary poets from the U.S., Ireland, Great Britain and Sri Lanka. It has been a joy for me to set such wonderful and diverse texts. I am grateful not only to “my” poets, but also to the incredible artists who have brought my songs to life so beautifully.”

These are first recordings of two dramatic works by American composer Thomas Pasatieri. Written for Beverly Sills, Before Breakfast dates from 1978 and has an unusual history (including having the original score accidentally thrown in the trash by the maid). After an unsuccessful performance the score was put away and it wasn't until 2002 that it was revived and revised for Lauren Flanagan. Flanagan was the inspiration for Lady Macbeth and premiered the work in 2008 with the forces on this recording.

Always in pursuit of versatility, Theresa Treadway Lloyd's career has been an evolutionary one. By 12 she was an accomplished pianist with her own roster of students in southwest Oklahoma. She honed these skills after receiving a full scholarship to the Sherwood Music School in Chicago at 15. Her mentor at Oklahoma University, Jack Harrold, discovered her rare and expressive coloratura abilities. She eventually joined the Metropolitan Opera Studio in 1970. In a few years her Carnegie Hall debut would receive acclaim and lead to engagements with the opera companies of Boston, Miami, Tulsa, etc., with a repertoire that includes all the major mezzo-coloratura roles. With this re-release of Blue Moods, Theresa memorializes some of the music of her late brother-in-law, Timothy Lloyd, whose work inspired the recordings of these songs by her contemporaries, Ned Rorem, Jack Beeson and Thomas Pasatieri. Departing from her bel canto style of singing, she explores American music with a more popular vocal sensibility. The result is a "cross-over" album long before the term was popular. She can also be heard in song cycles by Seymour Barab, William Bolcom, Libby Larsen and Andre Previn on TROY408, Music from Luzerne.

This recording of hybrid vocal selections highlights the works of seven prominent 21st century composers who blur the lines between opera, classical art song, and other musical genres. This is music that is as appropriate to major concert halls as it is to nontraditional spaces. Sequina DuBose is a stunning performer most noted for her engaging stage presence — whether performing operatic roles, or as soprano soloist in Wynton Marsalis' work, All Rise. She has toured internationally as a soloist with The American Spiritual Ensemble and with Damien Sneed and Chorale Le Chateau. Dr. DuBose is on the faculty at UNC Charlotte. She is joined by pianist Gregory Thompson, known for his work as a solo and collaborative artist in the U.S., Europe, and Asia.

This recording emerged from a series of personal Scottish connections of tenor Justin Vickers; his Scottish heritage; his collaboration with Scottish pianist Geoffrey Duce; and his scholarly work with Jennifer Oates on the composer Hamish MacCunn. The first recording of MacCunn's Cycle of Six Love-Lyrics, is paired with a selection of his other songs, along with works by Scottish composer Judith Weir, and Britten's cycles set to the poetry of Robert Burns. Justin Vickers has a distinguished career as a recitalist, opera singer, chamber musician, and educator. He is on the faculty of Illinois State University, Normal. His collaborator Gretchen Church is on the faculty at Illinois Wesleyan University at Bloomington. Pianist Geoffrey Duce is on the faculty at Illinois State University.

The texts for this magnificent oratorio, The Revelations of Divine Love, are adapted primarily from the writings of Julian of Norwich (c. 1342-1416); an excerpt from the Book of Margery Kempe; two poems by Robert Herrick and one by Elizabeth Kirschner. The primary concept underlying this oratorio is the presence of two distinct discourses. One is a sequence taken from Julian's religious visions and the other is a "sonic geography" of Nantucket Island.

Composer Cecil Price Walden says that Hours “is a journey through a dark night of the soul,” with inspiration taken from the Book of Hours — an exact guide for how and when to pray. Born in 1991, Walden draws on the rich musical, literary, and culinary legacies of the South to create work that is both familiar and new. Mezzo-soprano Alice Anne Light is known for her expressive, limpid singing and sound technique across a broad variety of repertoire. She is a frequent performer on the opera stage, in musical theater, and in recital. She is on the faculty of Texas Tech University.

Baritone Bradley Robinson explains what moved him to pursue this recording: "Many know of Ives the musical experimenter, life insurance revolutionist and, at times, the short-tempered eccentric. But there was so much more to the man: Ives the Devoted Son, Loving Husband, Adoring Father, Charity Volunteer, Philosopher, Social Activist, Man of Great Spiritual Convictions, Musical Jokester, Publicity-shunning Philanthropist; and the list goes on. " Robinson invites us to get to know Ives better by seeing how deeply the manner in which he expressed himself musically was influenced by factors which included events he personally experienced, his attitudes towards everyday things, philosophic and/or religious beliefs, and wonderful sense of humor. Bradley Robinson has performed opera, oratorio, and musical theatre throughout the United States to critical acclaim and is on the faculty at the University of Mississippi. His collaborator, pianist Stacy Rodgers, also teaches at the University of Mississippi.

This series devoted to one of America’s most significant composers brings together 12 vocal works, all but one written in the last two decades. Most of the shorter selections were composed for the Works and Process at the Guggenheim series in New York, and were designed for programs honoring the various poets (Les Murray, John Ashbery, Derek Walcott, Stanley Kunitz and Paul Auster).

Born in California, composer Alva Henderson studied at San Francisco State University and the San Francisco Conservatory, where he concentrated on voice and composition. Henderson is known for his operas and vocal music, reflecting his interest in the potential of the human voice. His collected songs presented on this 2-CD set are gems of the American song genre. Sung by soprano Melanie Emelio, a versatile performer and noted pedagogue on the faculty at Pepperdine University and baritone John Kramar, who has performed in opera and concert productions around the country, these songs possess great color, style and sheer beauty.

Charles Edward Ives (1874-1954) was a prolific composer of orchestral, instrumental, and vocal music. He composed more songs than any other type of music. In four volumes, four singers accompanied by their individual pianists, present more than 150 songs chronologically, the first recording of the complete songs of Charles Ives. Ives authorized transposition of them, so they can be sung by all voices. This amazing body of work from a musician who was also an inventive and successful insurance executive, span the 35 years of Ives's compositional life, mirroring the many facets of his character: tenderness, humor, disapproval of hypocrisy and sham, nostalgia, Americanism, Yankeeism, religion, socialism, love of nature. Some of the songs are extremely difficult; others are simpler; few can be picked up and read right off. They resemble a workshop filled with Ives's ideas, fragmentary or extended. Most were published in 114 Songs - the book compiled, published, and distributed at Ives's own expense in 1922; others were composed "post-114," among them Peaks, Yellow Leaves, The One Way, A Sea Dirge and In the Mornin'. The Ives oeuvre is substantial, and his output in songs alone is richer and more fulsome by far than might be expected from any career, let alone a curtailed one. This four volume set of the complete songs of Charles Ives is a major contribution toward the understanding, appreciation, and enjoyment of one of the greatest song collections in the history of music.

Charles Edward Ives (1874-1954) was a prolific composer of orchestral, instrumental, and vocal music. He composed more songs than any other type of music. In four volumes, four singers accompanied by their individual pianists, present more than 150 songs chronologically, the first recording of the complete songs of Charles Ives. Ives authorized transposition of them, so they can be sung by all voices. This amazing body of work from a musician who was also an inventive and successful insurance executive, span the 35 years of Ives's compositional life, mirroring the many facets of his character: tenderness, humor, disapproval of hypocrisy and sham, nostalgia, Americanism, Yankeeism, religion, socialism, love of nature. Some of the songs are extremely difficult; others are simpler; few can be picked up and read right off. They resemble a workshop filled with Ives's ideas, fragmentary or extended. Most were published in 114 Songs - the book compiled, published, and distributed at Ives's own expense in 1922; others were composed "post-114," among them Peaks, Yellow Leaves, The One Way, A Sea Dirge and In the Mornin'. The Ives oeuvre is substantial, and his output in songs alone is richer and more fulsome by far than might be expected from any career, let alone a curtailed one. This four volume set of the complete songs of Charles Ives is a major contribution toward the understanding, appreciation, and enjoyment of one of the greatest song collections in the history of music.

Charles Edward Ives (1874-1954) was a prolific composer of orchestral, instrumental, and vocal music. He composed more songs than any other type of music. In four volumes, four singers accompanied by their individual pianists, present more than 150 songs chronologically, the first recording of the complete songs of Charles Ives. Ives authorized transposition of them, so they can be sung by all voices. This amazing body of work from a musician who was also an inventive and successful insurance executive, span the 35 years of Ives's compositional life, mirroring the many facets of his character: tenderness, humor, disapproval of hypocrisy and sham, nostalgia, Americanism, Yankeeism, religion, socialism, love of nature. Some of the songs are extremely difficult; others are simpler; few can be picked up and read right off. They resemble a workshop filled with Ives's ideas, fragmentary or extended. Most were published in 114 Songs - the book compiled, published, and distributed at Ives's own expense in 1922; others were composed "post-114," among them Peaks, Yellow Leaves, The One Way, A Sea Dirge and In the Mornin'. The Ives oeuvre is substantial, and his output in songs alone is richer and more fulsome by far than might be expected from any career, let alone a curtailed one. This four volume set of the complete songs of Charles Ives is a major contribution toward the understanding, appreciation, and enjoyment of one of the greatest song collections in the history of music.