Besides a myriad of shorter vocal and instrumental works, Charles Ives composed magnificent large pieces-for example, the Fourth Symphony and the "Concord" Piano Sonata-that grew from advanced sketches and improvisations generated over several years. He also constructed brief works-such as Over the Pavements, All the Way Around and Back, Calcium Night Light, In Re Con Moto Et Al, the two Fugues in Four Parts-that were deliberate and well-defined, although never intellectually dry, experiments in structure.

The Tone Roads series for various instrumental ensembles are among this most advanced writing and anticipated several techniques that were not employed or "invented" by other composers until decades later. The expression "tone roads" meant for Ives a piece for a combination of instruments (sometimes including voice) in which the timbre and material played by one of them describes the character given to the whole piece. This instrument is usually the first heard.

Thus, in "Tone Roads No. 1" of 1911, scored for flute, B flat clarinet, bassoon, and strings, the first instruments heard are two or more violoncelli which introduce the energetic Allegro subject in sharp, staccato tones played forte. A contrasting countersubject played legato is heard in the bassoon just before the end of the subject. The subject is then imitated, a half step above (!) the original key, in a sharply staccato flute, while the string quintet takes up the countersubject, harmonizing it in parallel chords in fourths.

The writing then proceeds to use techniques that would not emerge for another decade or so in the early serialist developments of the Viennese school: in measure six, the bassoon plays an inversion of the main subject, transposed down a half step. Smaller gestures derived from the subject and countersubject, in both inverted and transposed forms, are then expanded upon. In measure fifteen, the subject is boldly stated, fortissimo, with the larger intervals stretched even further, creating an intense drama. This is an effect often found in Schoenberg's later works. (After migrating to the United States in the 1930s to escape the Nazis, Schoenberg remarked that Ives was one of the greatest American composers.)

At measure twenty, the lower strings begin to sustain notes of the row in thick low chords in long triplets. The winds play independent versions of the row while the strings continue with the subject in yet another transposition and with the large intervals stretched even wider. Each group has distinct rhythmic structures that allow the listener to hear them clearly independent and the whole as a dense complexity.

At measure thirty-three, yet another version of the main subject is introduced, with winds and high strings in unison, while the lower strings execute a dramatic drone in tremolo. This quiets to a non-tremolo, while the bassoon bursts forth with a recapitulation of the main subject in the original key. A partial repetition from the fifth measure then takes place, skipping from measure thirty-two to an emphatic one-measure coda, played fff, with tremolo in the lower strings-yet another version of the opening three notes of the main theme.

It cannot be strictly claimed that this piece established twelve-tone serialist technique, because although the theme contains all twelve tones of the chromatic scale, they are arranged in a "tonal" manner, with repeated tones and tendency toward a "center". Ives was obviously aware of this; among his often humorous notes on the score and in memos, he wrote "All Roads Lead to Rome and to F.E. Hartwell & Co. Gent's Furnishings."

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