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Posted February 11, 2005.
Before the production of novels outstripped the demand, there was talk of The Great American Novel.
I've only read a few of these. I'm afraid that books like The Great Gatsby do not interest me much. I consider the novels on my list, below, far more interesting, and in their own peculiar ways, more American
than the usual suspects:
Still, several acknowledged, mainstream classics of American lit do strike me as perfect, such as The Red Badge of Courage, while an imperfect one strikes me as better than all the rest, Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn.
Trouble is, I read more British authors than American. And I like minor gemstones — semiprecious stones — more than diamonds and sapphires. Besides, I haven't read Blood Meridian yet!
On the subject of the Great American Symphony, on the other hand, and despite my admiration for many of the contenders, my selection is not in the least out of the ordinary, not the slightest bit heretical: Roy Harris's Third Symphony.
This one-movement work is a wonder. It begins expansively, with an arresting melody that reminds me of so many others, but still is clearly the composer's own. The music transforms itself into heroic Americana, quite exciting. And then it moves from light to dark, and the symphony ends tragically,
with bursts of almost bitter chords. A number of composers have tried this, but none more successfully. Beethoven's Fifth goes from challenge and darkness to triumph; Harris's moves the other direction. It is, really, as perfect as Beethoven's Fifth.
I don't listen to it that often. I tend not to listen to the greatest works over and over. Take Beethoven's Fifth — I've probably put his Fourth on the stereo more times!
With Harris one doesn't often substitute a lesser symphony, however. Why? Because Harris as a composer was very uneven. For some reason, after the Third, he buried himself in the American folk song movement too deep; it took him quite a while to dig himself out. Late in his life, when pretty much everyone had abandoned him, some of his productions are almost as good as the Third (so I've been told). But his was a tragic career.
So I guess his tragic symphony is apt for him. A memorial.
But for us, the listeners, it's just a great work.
It's often compared (and paired) with Aaron Copland's Third Symphony. And Copland's is quite good, even great. But there's just something too earnest about it, too grandstanding. Besides, Copland's second numbered symphony, the Short Symphony, is much better.
I've heard tell that it was Harris whose style sparked the Americana movement; others say it was Virgil Thomson. I haven't checked the dates. I simply note that Charles Ives's Third Symphony precedes them all, and is far better than most, including Thomson's Hymn Tune Symphony with its idiotic variations on Yes, Jesus Loves Me.
Like Harris, like Copland's Americana, like much of the work of William Schuman, Ives's Third sounds American.
And yet it is Ives's Fourth that is the greater symphony.
So, I give the award for Great American Symphony to Roy Harris's Third. No question.
But a number of symphonies by Americans are as great. They just don't sound especially American:
Americaninto the same conversation.
great Americanconjures up a chuckle — something one shouldn't be doing in the presence of these works of spontaneous spirituality.
And then there are all symphonies composed by Europeans who came to American shores. Is there anything really American in Tcherepnin's Fourth, or Bohuslav Martinu's amazing Symphonies Fantastiques?
Still, I'm willing to grant to Martinu's Sinfonietta La Jolla the title Great American Sinfonietta
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