Variations on “America” by Charles Ives as Heard on the Jingle Jangle Morning in Emerson Playground by You and the Signers of the United States Constitution (and who knows, maybe the FBI)

From Wind Repertory Project
David Borden

David Borden (ed. James Spinazzola)


This article is a stub. If you can help add information to it,
please join the WRP and visit the FAQ (left sidebar) for information.



General Info

Year: 1968 /
Duration: c. 11:45
Difficulty: (see Ratings for explanation)
Publisher: Unknown
Cost: Score and Parts - Unknown


Instrumentation

(Needed - please join the WRP if you can help.)

Recorded voices and other sounds


Errata

None discovered thus far.


Program Notes

The composer was inspired by "flag-waver" music, patriotic music that inspires audiences to wave little flags. But the finished product is anything but proudly American, centering as it does on the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King.


Commissioned for the Ithaca High School band with assistance from Music Educators National Conference (known today as the National Association for Music Educators), Variations on America by Charles Ives as Heard… reflects a fascination with electronic music while swiftly succeeding in the commissioning project’s primary goal: to prompt student musicians to think differently about how music can sound and be performed. In the piece, Borden blends acoustic sounds of winds and percussion with synthesized patches and clips pulled from American television and radio of the late ‘60s. This aesthetic, when combined with Ives’ source material, results in a sound world that is simultaneously sardonic and thought-provoking, reflecting both the composer’s inquiry into the possibilities of combining electronic and acoustic sonic materials and his frustration with the political turmoil which pervaded the U.S. in 1968.

- Program Note by Louis Menchaca for the Ithaca College Wind Ensemble concert program, 6 December 2021


Media

(Needed - please join the WRP if you can help.)


State Ratings

None discovered thus far.


Performances

To submit a performance please join The Wind Repertory Project


Works for Winds by This Composer


Resources