Opera review: The Ives Project – New Camerata Opera

“You cannot set art off in a corner and hope for it to have vitality, reality, and substance.” So said Charles Ives, 1874 -1954, the – in my judgement – founding father of modernist 20thcentury American classical music.

Bravo to New Camerata, the innovative New York opera company who on Thursday took Ives at his word. The company brought his neglected songbook from that corner, and plonked it centre stage in their first complete presentation of The Ives Project; a filmography comprising a representative selection from the composer’s 144 songs, three years in the making.