The Unanswered Question

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The composition " The Unanswered Question " is one of the most famous works by the American composer Charles Ives (1874–1954), composed around 1906 and revised in the 1930s. The revised version was premiered in 1946, the first version in 1984. The work places three musical layers (strings, trumpet and woodwind quartet) simultaneously over and against each other.

Origin and characterization

Charles Ives had already ended his activity as a church organist in 1902 and turned to work as an insurance salesman. He pursued composition as a leisure activity. His works can often not be dated exactly, and he also subjected them to profound revisions in some cases decades later. Around 1906, the first version of “The Unanswered Question” was written for a chamber music ensemble, in time near the somewhat larger cast “Central Park in the Dark”. Ives saw both works temporarily as a pair under the name "Two Contemplations", with "The Unanswered Question" as the first movement. The latter he alternately titled "Largo to Presto: The Unanswered Question: A Cosmic Landscape", "A Contemplation of a Serious Matter" and "The Unanswered Perennial Question". The title "The Unanswered Question" comes from the poem "The Sphinx" by Ralph Waldo Emerson , an American transcendentalist whose worldview was close to Ives. Both works have in common that stylistically different material is superimposed in different meters and keys.

"The Unanswered Question" provides for the following line-up: four flutes (alternatively oboe instead of 3rd flute , clarinet instead of 4th flute ), trumpet (alternatively English horn , oboe or clarinet) as well as a string quartet with 1st and 2nd violin , Viola and violoncello (reinforced by a double bass playing at octave intervals for larger ensembles ). The string group should be placed behind the stage ("off-stage") or at a distance from the winds. The performance lasts about 6 minutes.

The work places three musical layers simultaneously on top of and against each other: the harmonized strings play a four-part chorale-like movement (G major) in triple pianissimo and a very slow tempo, with which the work also fades away after the wind instruments have fallen silent . The solo trumpet, which is also muted, starts after 15 bars and plays an identical two-bar motif consisting of five notes seven times at almost equal intervals , which has no clear tonal connection to the music of the strings. The woodwind quartet reacts six times to the trumpet motif in longer sections of increasing tempo, increasing complexity and dissonance .

Versions, premiere and reception

1930 to 1935 Ives revised “The Unanswered Question” and added a foreword. Accordingly, the solo trumpet symbolizes "the eternal question of existence" ("The Perennial Question of Existence"). The woodwind quartet stands for the “hunt for the invisible answer” (“hunt for 'The Invisible Answer'”). The strings represent "the silence (s) of the druids who know, see and hear nothing" ("The Silences of the Druids - Who Know, See and Hear Nothing") and close the work in "undisturbed solitude" ("Undisturbed Solitude "). The most striking difference between the two versions is the final note of the trumpet motif, which in the first version is identical to the opening note (B), but is a whole tone higher in the second version (C). A more recent edition compares both versions.

"The Unanswered Question" was first heard in the revised version on May 11, 1946 at Columbia University (New York) with students from the Juilliard School under the direction of Theodore Bloomfield (strings, off-stage) and Edgar Schenkman (brass). "Central Park in the Dark" and Ives' 2nd String Quartet were premiered at the same concert. The first version of "The Unanswered Question" was premiered on March 17, 1984 in New York under the direction of Dennis Russell Davies .

The first record of the revised version appeared in 1951, interpreted by Will Lorin and the Polymusic Chamber Orchestra . Version 1 was first recorded in 1986 with Michael Tilson Thomas and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra

Leonard Bernstein took up the title of the work in a six-part series of lectures within the Norton Lectures . "The Unanswered Question" was also used in the film music, for example in death scenes, for example in " Run Lola Run " (1998) by Tom Tykwer or " Der schmale Grat " (1998) by Terrence Malick .

Web links

literature

  • Hans Renner, Klaus Schweizer (eds.): Reclams Konzertführer , 10th edition, Philipp Reclam jun., Stuttgart 1976, ISBN 3-15-007720-6 , p. 554.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ives the Man: His Life. Charles Ives Society
  2. ↑ a b Notes Scott Mortensen (Engl.)
  3. ^ A b Egon Voss: On Charles E. Ives' The Unanswered Question . Program booklet concert symphony orchestra. des BR, headed by Christoph von Dohnányi, 17./18. January 2019, Herkulessaal Munich
  4. ^ Charles E. Ives: The Unanswered Question. Score. Southern Music Publishing Co. (1953)
  5. ^ Carol K. Baron (1990): Dating Charles Ives's Music: Facts and Fictions . Perspectives of New Music, Winter, 1990, Vol. 28, No. 1 (Winter, 1990), pp. 20-56
  6. ^ Paul C. Echols, Noel Zahler (ed., 1984): Charles Ives, The Unanswered Question. Peer International Corporation
  7. ^ The Unanswered Question: Six Talks at Harvard, 1973
  8. ↑ Information on Bodensee Musikversand