Guest Donald Berman, piano: Ives and Other Transcendentalists 10/28/24

Monday, Oct. 28, 2024  •  7:30 p.m.

Timashev Recital Hall
Columbus, OH

Charles Ives and Other Transcendentalists 
Donald Berman, piano
 

Program

Charles Ives (1874–1954):

Impression of the St. Gaudens in Boston Common (“Black March” ) (1915)

Piano Sonata No. 2, Concord, Mass., 1840–1860  (1915)

I.     Emerson (on Ralph Waldo Emerson)

II.    Hawthorne (on Nathaniel Hawthorne)

III.  The Alcotts (on Bronson Alcott and Louisa May Alcott)

IV.  Thoreau (on Henry David Thoreau)
 

— INTERMISSION —

Eve Beglarian: As syllable from sound (2023)

(on Emily Dickinson)

David Sanford: Underground (2020)

(on Harriet Tubman)

Marti Epstein: The Piano at the Palace Beautiful (2019)

(on Louisa May Alcott)

Elena Ruehr: Summer on the Lakes in 1843 (2018)

(on Margaret Fuller)
 

About this program

Other Transcendentalists honors one of the 20th century's most iconoclastic composers, Charles Ives, by placing two of his solo piano works in conversation with a set of newly commissioned musical portraits of women who were pivotal figures in American Transcendentalism.

At the center of this focused program is Ives' Second Piano Sonata, better known as the "Concord," which characterizes four giants of American intellectual history who were all at work in New England in the mid-19th century. The first is an evocation of the orator Ralph Waldo Emerson, after which the sonata reflects on Nathaniel Hawthorne's flights of fantasy, educator Bronson Alcott's homespun domesticity, and Henry David Thoreau's potent naturalism and pensive calls for abolition.

This quartet of musical portraits is the inspiration for the works Berman commissioned from Eve Beglarian, David Sanford, Marti Epstein and Elena Ruehr, who have used the "Concord" as a launching point for portraying women Transcendentalists.

Beglarian's As syllable from sound uncovers the surprising links between Emily Dickinson's writings with the fiery oratory of Ives and Emerson. Sanford's Underground connects Hawthorne's idea of a Celestial Railroad to the real-life Underground Railroad of Harriet Tubman. Epstein's Piano at the Palace Beautiful is an evocation of Louisa May Alcott's character Beth March, a reimagining of the hymns and wondrous sounds described in Little Women. And Ruehr's Summer on the Lakes in 1943 is a portrait of Margaret Fuller, America’s first female journalist, translator, and travel writer.

As we approach Ives' 150th birthday in 2024 [October 20], this program sonically refocuses the power of the Transcendentalist era while reframing our understanding of the enigmatic Ives himself, who Leonard Bernstein called "the Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln of American composers."

Other Transcendentalists also represents the capstone of Berman's life work as an Ives scholar, in which he has served as president and treasurer of the Charles Ives Society, editor of the three-volume The Shorter Piano Works of Ives, and a pianist who for decades has delivered unparalleled performances of Ives' solo piano music. 
 

About the Artist

A multidimensional pianist, pedagogue and scholar, Donald Berman has won tremendous acclaim for his "stupendous abilities, both athletic and intellectual" (Boston Sunday Globe) and performances hailed as "stunning, adventurous, and substantive" (New York Times).

With an emphasis on presenting American music of the 20th and 21st centuries, Berman's inventive recital programs have been featured on the United States' biggest stages for contemporary music — from Carnegie's Weill and Zankel Halls to National Sawdust and (Le) Poisson Rouge — as well as major venues across Europe, Asia and the Middle East. An enthusiastic commissioner of new music, he has added more than 200 works to the contemporary canon — many of which he performs alongside classical repertoires to provoke new and fascinating revelations and connections across periods and styles.

Berman's body of work as a recording artist demonstrates the breadth and depth of his engagement with the music of our time. His albums have included numerous world-premiere recordings as well as illuminating performances of previously unknown works of 20th-century American composers, including Charles Ives (The Unknown Ives, Vols. I and II ), Carl Ruggles (The Uncovered Ruggles), and Elliott Carter and Roger Sessions (Americans in Rome). As concerto soloist and chamber musician, Berman's discography includes collaborations with the Boston Modern Orchestra Project (George Perle: Serenades), soprano Susan Narucki (This Island, The Light That Is Felt: Songs of Charles Ives, and the Grammy-nominated The Edge of Silence), and the Borromeo Quartet (The Worlds Revolve). Upcoming albums include a survey of Elena Ruehr songs with baritone Stephen Salters and a new recording of Ives's Concord Sonata and Impression of the St. Gaudens in Boston Common, to be released on Avie Records during the composer's sesquicentennial celebrations in 2024.

A former fellow of the Harvard Radcliffe Institute, Berman currently serves as Chair of Keyboard Studies at Longy School of Music of Bard College, and leads Tufts University's New Music Ensemble. He is also the General Editor of three volumes of Ives' Shorter Works for Piano — a titanic project representing 30 years of work — and President and Treasurer of the Charles Ives Society, where he is leading an extensive expansion of the Society's digital archives on charlesives.org.

Berman's trajectory as a musician and scholar was set in motion by four important teachers: Mildred Victor, George Barth, John Kirkpatrick (who premiered Ives' Concord Sonata in 1939), and legendary pedagogue Leonard Shure.

donaldbermanpiano.com