Three Dances (1952) by Harry Partch

Notes

1. Samba—A DECENT AND HONORABLE MISTAKE
2. Heartbeat Rhythm—RHYTHM OF THE WOMB–MELODY OF THE GRAVE
3. Afro-Chinese Minuet—HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!

We begin this evening’s concert with the Three Dances that begin the third section of Partch’s Plectra & Percussion Dances (1952). The composer warned, “It’s an amazing fact that the world of dance music, and of Latin American dance music particularly, has produced an army of purists that is equal of anything that serious classical music can offer. I say this in order to advise you that the first scene, for example, “A Decent and Honorable Mistake,” may not be recognizable to you as a samba. The second scene, “Rhythm of the Womb, Melody of the Grave,” is based on a rhythmically contrapuntal heartbeat. The third scene, “Happy Birthday to You!” begins with an African-sounding marimba and somehow gets involved with a Chinese- sounding guitar in a pentatonic melody, and so I call it an Afro-Chinese Minuet.” This last dance ends with these directions: “Slowly enough that canon TRIADS are distinct,” after which they are to be played “faster than the previous runs so that the triads are NOT distinct.” The harmonies of each of those descending triads are wildly divergent, as if the composer is pausing to reminisce about various years past, but finally admits that as a 51-year old they are, in fact, a blur.

REDCAT 2024: LSD Ride

June 14-15, 2024

Three Dances (1952) HARRY PARTCH

  • Samba—A DECENT AND HONORABLE MISTAKE
  • Heartbeat Rhythm—RHYTHM OF THE WOMB–MELODY OF THE GRAVE
  • Afro-Chinese Minuet—HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!

Reið (Raidō)II Ride/Journey JEFFREY HOLMES

First Performance

Progressions HARRY PARTCH

  • Intro + Progressions Within One Octave (1942)
  • Sonata Dementia: Abstraction & Delusion (1949)

Five Intrusions (1950)

  • Study #1 Olympos’ Pentatonic
  • The Wind (Ella Young, Lao-tze)
  • Study #2 Archytas’ Enharmonic
  • The Street (Willard Motley)
  • The Waterfall (Ella Young)

— I N T E R M I S S I O N —

LSD: Huxley’s Last Trip—selected scenes ANNE LEBARON

Librettists: Gerd Stern, Ed Rosenfeld, and Anne LeBaron

  • Scene 1: Huxley’s Last Trip—Part 1
  • Scene 3: Double Helix: Soliloquy No. 1 (a twisted example…)
  • Scene 6: Three Lunches: Soliloquy No. 2 (Finnegan’s Wake)
  • Scene 8: Mary Meyer and JFK

The Cast (in order of appearance)

  • Aldous Huxley SCOTT GRAFF
  • Laura Huxley; LSD Trio (Death) AUBREY BABCOCK
  • LSD Trio (Love); Jackie Kennedy ANNA SCHUBERT
  • LSD Trio (Sex); Marilyn Monroe NELLE ANDERSON
  • James Watson; John F. Kennedy DOMINIC DELZOMPO
  • Francis Crick; Timothy Leary TODD STRANGE
  • Albert Hofmann; Marshall McLuhan JON KEENAN
  • Anita Hofmann; Mary Meyer MARIA ELENA ALTANY

The program includes an instrument “petting zoo”: audiences are encouraged to interact with the instruments on stage after the show.

Cloud Chamber Music by Harry Partch

Live at REDCAT, June 16-17, 2023

Notes

PARTCH Ensemble performing Harry Partch’s Cloud Chamber Music at REDCAT on June 16-17, 2023.

Baritone ~ Adapted Guitar III ~ Kithara I ~ Adapted Viola ~ Bass & Diamond Marimbas ~ Cloud Chamber Bowls ~ Deer Hooves Rattle ~ Voices

Program note by John Schneider:

Cloud Chamber Music (1950) opens with a sonorous carillon on four Cloud-Chamber Bowls, their distinctive bell-like tones yielding to a mournful microtonal lament on Adapted Viola and Adapted Guitar. Following this, in a faster tempo, the Viola introduces the melody of “Canción de los Muchachos” of the Isleta tribe of New Mexico (a tune Partch learned when transcribing it from an Edison cylinder recorded by Charles Lummis). This is then sung by all the musicians, accompanying themselves on their instruments, except the Kithara, whose player takes up a Native American deer-hoof rattle. This ritual provokes another outburst on the Cloud-Chamber Bowls. Ben Johnston has suggested a scenario implicit in this sequence of musical events: “Cloud-Chamber Music,” he writes, “begins as a depressed reaction to a false clarion, but then seizes American Indian incentives as a reinvigorating antidote.”

Amateur California Prune Picker (2022) — by Kyle Gann

Live at REDCAT, June 16-17, 2023

Notes

Chromelodeon ~ Adapted Viola ~ Gourd Tree ~ Spoils of War ~ Bass & Diamond Marimbas ~ Cloud Chamber Bowls

Program note by Kyle Gann:

As a long-time microtonalist, I’ve always wanted to write something for the Harry Partch instruments, so I am extremely grateful to John Schneider for offering me the chance. My idea was to prove, or perhaps I should say test, the universality of Partch’s ensemble by trying to write in a style that didn’t sound like Partch. Accordingly, I concentrated on the microtonal relationships among the various harmonies, and had to wrestle with the fact that not all of his instruments had the same pitches. After fifty years of composing, I was made to feel like a rank amateur in this totally idiosyncratic environment, and as Partch inveighed against his performers looking like an “amateur California prune picker,” I thought I should embrace the title. Were I to attempt a second essay, I would probably surrender and write “à la Harry.” — K.G.

Dark Brother

Notes

Music by Harry Partch (1901-1974)
Final two paragraph’s of Thomas Wolfe’s “God’s Lonely Man.”

Performers:
Alison Bjorkedal – Kithara I
Vicki Ray – Chromolodeon
Derek Stein – Adapted Viola
T.J. Troy – Bass Marimba and Voice
Video captured and edited by Video Angel Productions
Audio recorded by Chris Votek

Presented by Jacaranda Music Series, First Presbyterian Church, Santa Monica, CA, November 9, 2019.

World Premiere of “Future Lilacs” (2016) by Ken Ueno

Notes

Color Theory Concert: PRISM Quartet and Partch

Ken Ueno: My work, “Future Lilacs,” metaphorically connects to color theory in blending different temperaments. It is the scientific reduction of sounds to a common denominator (thinking in terms of frequencies rather than scales) that helps me with this approach, which I consider a Newtonian way of rationalizing the ineffable.

June 12, 2016

Co-Presented by PRISM Quartet and Roulette