[Smt-talk] "The Cage" (Ives)

[David K Feurzeig]

Richard Hoffman wrote:

> Similarly, a couple of years ago students in my class noticed that the half note chord on the rest before "A boy" contains the pitches C A G E D. 

Yeah! Lambert singles out this chord as a sort of climax of the CAGE pun (as the almost climax of the piano part,the chord is prominent in several ways). I highly recommend his chapter on the song: Lambert makes remarkable observations about the note-name games, which makes it all the more surprising that he doesn't mention the pattern Elizabeth noted in the melody.

Michael Cuthbert's comment, which echoes a couple I've received off-list, suggests that the melodic pattern may have been overlooked at least partly because the C is represented by C#.

David 

David Feurzeig
Music Department
University of Vermont