King of Prussia, PA – Theodore Presser Company is thrilled to announce the release of the Complete Organ Music of Charles Ives (443-41003 - $29.99). An invaluable new monument of organ literature, the Complete Organ Music is crowned by two critical editions of the celebrated Variations on "America," shedding light on both the familiar 1949 edition and the original draft from 1892. Over a dozen more unfamiliar works are presented, along with historical and critical notes.

But that’s not all! Theodore Presser Company’s VP of Publishing, Daniel Dorff, invites musicians around the world to celebrate this release on Charles Ives’ birthday: Saturday, October 20th. Click here to read more about the party and to see sample pages as well as the table of contents. Read Dorff’s message below:

“Join the worldwide Ives Complete Organ Music Birthday Bash (#ICOMBB) by asking your organist friends to get a copy of the book and schedule a performance of part or all of the book on Ives’s birthday. We plan to make lots of noise on this special day, so please forward this invitation to your friends, colleagues, and make internet announcements, to help the party go viral.

Please feel free to publicize your events and everyone else’s, upload to YouTube, and let us know concert info c/o ddorff@presser.com and the complete list will be publicized to the media and available for all other organizations to share and announce. You can also tweet at us using the hashtag #ICOMBB or post on our Facebook wall.

There are no rules or protocols, just a global birthday party celebrating Ives and his organ music.”

Born in Danbury, Connecticut, on October 20, 1874, Charles Ives was the son of famed Civil War bandleader George Ives. At the age of 5, he started piano lessons; and he began composing at around age 13. He attended Yale University, after which he chose to forego a musical career, moving to New York in 1898 to take a job as a clerk with an insurance firm. This did not prevent him from pursuing music on the side, however. He worked as a church organist and choirmaster until 1902, and continued composing new works until 1927. Charles Ives’s music was innovative, daring and explorative, ahead of its time; but respect for his music gradually rose. In the 1930s and 40s many influential musicians took interest in his work, including Aaron Copland, Lou Harrison and pianist John Kirkpatrick, whose performances of Ives’ music received much praise. Among these important performances was the 1946 premiere, conducted by Lou Harrison, of his Symphony No. 3, for which Charles Ives won a Pulitzer Prize the following year. Charles Ives died in New York City on May 19, 1954. He is remembered today as one of the great American composers, and as a maverick whose musical experimentation and exploration set the stage for, and continues to influence the course of, American classical music for generations to come.

For more information about Charles Ives and his music, visit the The Charles Ives Society’s website.

Offering music by today’s greatest composers and teachers, Theodore Presser Company is the leader in publishing educational and recital music. Theodore Presser Company is a full-range music publisher and distributes the music of over 30 publishers from around the globe, with a combined sales catalog that features over 60,000 available works. For more information about new publications from Theodore Presser Company or to locate a dealer near you, log on to www.presser.com or e-mail us at sales@presser.com. For review copies of the publications listed in this release, please contact Heidi Vanderlee at (212) 777-0900, ext. 230 or send an e-mail to hvanderlee@presser.com.