Grid disappears (500 error) with large data source

My app has a large list of data (only 1 column) and I have to show them all (no paging). With a small amount of data it works fine but when I have all the data in (around 260 items, not that many) the grid disappears from the page. Debugging shows a 500 error on the server. 

I have done the following testing:
- I tried the page on Chrome, IE and Opera. All give the same result.
- I replaced the grid with a treeview. Same result - with around 150 entries it's fine, with 260 it disappears (although in the case of the treeview it doesn't disappear completely, it leaves a message that the request failed and a button to retry.

How I'm getting the data:

@(Html.Kendo().Grid<Song>()
                      .Name("SongsGrid")
                      .Columns(columns =>
                          {
                              columns.Bound(o => o.Name);
                          })
                      .DataSource(dataSource => dataSource.Ajax().Read(read => read.Action("SongList", "Song")))
                      .Selectable()
                      .Events(events => events.Change("songSelected"))
                      )

and

@(Html.Kendo().TreeView().Name("treeviewSongs")
            .HtmlAttributes(new {@class="demo-section" })
            .DataTextField("Name")
            .DataSource(dataSource => dataSource.Read(read => read.Action("SongListForTreeview", "Song")
        )

What are my options?

Thanks.