New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Pianist Jeremy Denk and violinist Stefan Jackiw's performance of the first movement of Charles Ives's Violin Sonata No. 4 ("Children's Day at the Camp Meeting"), from the upcoming album Ives Denk, is out now on Nonesuch Records. The pianist, known as a champion of Charles Ives, is acclaimed for his performances of the great American composer's works. Ives Denk, due October 18 in celebration of the 150th anniversary of Ives' birth, features the composer's four violin sonatas, performed with Jackiw, as well as remastered versions of his Sonatas No. 1 and 2 for piano, from Denk's 2010 debut recording, Jeremy Denk Plays Ives.
In his liner note, Denk says that Ives' "deepest dream was to create an original musical style, a fresh and uniquely American voice. He achieved this. But it was a voice most didn't want to hear, and still don't. He is one of history's least popular populists ... Ives' writings—especially the later ones, when he was in terrible physical decline—are ... often unhinged with anger, full of mean-spirited nicknames and simplistic binaries, they reflect some of the worst angles of America. One thing that saves Ives' music from these dangers is his sense of humor, and his willingness to embrace failure."
"A sonata about the intersection of piety and youthful pranks," Denk says of fourth sonata. "In the first movement, one group of children marches to a hymn; another boy dutifully practices his fugues. These styles interrupt and overlap wildly. Ives quips that 'the loudest singers, and also those with the best voices, as is often the case, would sing most of the wrong notes.' The counterpoint thickens, until the Deacon rings a gong, and the kids innocently march off as if nothing had happened."
"Mr. Denk's playing exuded affinity for Ives and vivid imagination," says the New York Times. "Mr. Jackiw, deftly balancing fervor and elegance, beautiful tone and earthy colorings, proved a comparably inspired Ivesian."
"Denk is a multi-faceted, intelligent pianist, equally at home playing solo in recital or concertos with orchestra," says the Guardian, "a natural, instinctive educator with a rare ability to reach out to his audience."
Jeremy Denk is one of America's foremost pianists, proclaimed by the New York Times as "a pianist you want to hear no matter what he performs." Denk is also a New York Times bestselling author, the recipient of both the MacArthur "Genius" Fellowship and the Avery Fisher Prize, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
In the 2024-25 season, Denk will continue his collaboration with longtime musical partners Joshua Bell and Steven Isserlis. This includes performances at the Tsindali Festival and Wigmore Hall, on the heels of his multi-concert artist residency at the Wigmore in 2023-24. Denk recently returned to the Lammermuir Festival in multiple performances, including the complete Ives violin sonatas with Maria Wloszczowska, and a solo recital featuring female composers from the past to the present day. He continues to perform this same solo program on tour across the US and will further his exploration of Bach in ongoing performances of the complete Partitas.
Denk's latest album of Mozart piano concertos was released in 2021 on Nonesuch Records. The album was deemed "urgent and essential" by BBC Radio 3 and also was Classic FM's Album of the Week. His recording of the Goldberg Variations reached No. 1 on the Billboard Classical Charts, and his recording of Beethoven's Piano Sonata Op. 111 paired with Ligeti's Études was named one of the best discs of the year by the New Yorker, NPR, and the Washington Post, while his account of the Beethoven sonata was selected by BBC Radio 3's Building a Library as the best available version recorded on modern piano. His New York Times bestselling memoir, Every Good Boy Does Fine, was published to universal acclaim in 2022.
