The Unanswered Ives is the first film about Charles Ives (1874-1954), an American modernist composer, one of the first American composers of international renown. The 60-minute documentary sheds light on Ives' life and work in all its facets and inconsistencies. American singer and composer Frank Zappa included Charles Ives in a list of influences that he presented in the liner notes of his debut album Freak Out! (1966). Ives continues to influence contemporary composers, arrangers and musicians. Planet Arts Records released Mists: Charles Ives for Jazz Orchestra. Ives befriended and encouraged a young Elliott Carter. In addition, Phil Lesh, bassist of the Grateful Dead, has described Ives as one of his two musical heroes.
Direction
Peitz weaves archival restraint with contemporary reverence.
Sound
Ives' cacophonous symphonies finally get their due.
Director
Anne-Kathrin Peitz
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Ives' 'The Unanswered Question' became a staple of 1960s counterculture programming, though he composed it in 1908—sixty years before hippies discovered it.
Phil Lesh's bass lines on 'Dark Star' owe direct debt to Ives' polytonal experiments—psychedelia's secret classical ancestor.
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